la 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
AT  LOS  ANGELES 


r~—         —.—  —  .  =«-=,.-=__-_,  , 

GIFT  OF 

Dr.   ERNEST  C.   MOORE 

THE  WALK  WITH  GOD 


THE 

WALK  WITH   GOD 

BY 

JULIA  WARD  HOWE 

Extracts  from  Mrs  Howe's  private  journals, 
together  with  some  verses  hitherto  (with  a 
few  exceptions}  unpublished;  and  an  Essay 
on  Immortality  entitled  "Beyond  The  Veil" 

EDITED  BY  HER  DAUGHTER 

LAURA  E.  RICHARDS 


NEW  YORK 

E.  P.  DUTTON  &  COMPANY 

681  FIFTH  AVENUE 


COPYRIGHT,  1919, 
BY  E.  P.  DUTTON  &  COMPANY 


All  Rights  Reserved 


TO 

THE  CHURCH  OF  THE  DISCIPLES, 
BOSTON.  MASSACHUSETTS 

AND  TO   THE  MEMORY  OF 

JAMES  FREEMAN  CLARKE 


215168 


'Oh!  for  a  closer  walk  with  God, 
A  calm  and  heavenly  frame" 

— WILLIAM  COOPER. 


EDITOR'S  NOTE 

My  mother  left  her  journals  to  me,  with  no 
suggestion  of  their  being  published.  Since,  how 
ever,  the  following  passages  may  conceivably  help 
and  comfort  other  seekers  of  the  Way,  it  seems 
in  accordance  with  her  spirit  of  love  and  service 
to  give  them  to  the  public.  I  do  so,  trusting  to 
her  forgiveness  if  I  have  erred. 

A  few  of  the  extracts  have  already  appeared  in 
the  "Life  and  Letters  of  Julia  Ward  Howe," 
and  are  reprinted  with  the  kind  permission  of  the 
Houghton  Mifflin  Company.  For  permission  to 
reprint  the  Essay  on  Immortality  I  am  indebted 
to  the  courtesy  of  Messrs.  Harper  and  Brothers. 

It  should  be  added  that  the  journals  are  more 
or  less  fragmentary,  and  that  several  volumes  are 
missing. 

L.  E.  R. 
Gardiner,  Maine, 

February, 


Vll 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

The  Word I 

The  Journal,  1864-1868 3 

To  Certain  Missionaries 1 8 

The  Journal,  1871-1873      ......  19 

The  Apostles 31 

The  Journal,  1874-1879 32 

Meditation 44 

The  Journal,  1880-1884 44 

Easter  Morning  Service  April  13,  1884  47 


The  Journal,  1884-1889 

All  Souls 

The  Journal,  1890 

Retrospects 

The  Journal,  1891 

After  the  Women  s  Rally,  Sept.  1891   . 
Trinity  Church,  Boston,  Christmas,  1891 
The  Journal,  1892 


47 
65 
66 
70 
7i 
73 
74 
76 


A  Moment's  Meditation  in  Cologne  Cathe 
dral     77 

At  Milwaukee 79 

1892 80 

The  Journal,  1893-1895 81 

1895 86 

A  Song  for  the  Youth  of  the  Christian  En 
deavor  Society 88 

ix 


CONTENTS 


The  Journal,  1895-1896 89 

The  Lord's  Supper 94 

The  Journal,  1897-1900 94 

1900 103 

The  Closed  Gentian 107 

The  Journal,  1901 108 

1901 .  109 

The  Journal,  1902 in 

The  Journal,  1903 115 

1903*  \ "6 

/poj,  ii 120 

The  Journal,  1904 121 

Good  Friday 125 

The  Journal,  1905 125 

The  New  Hymn 129 

The  Journal,  1906 132 

At  Church 133 

The  Journal,  1907-1909 135 

To  Philosophy 143 

The  Journal,  1910 144 

Meditation 145 

Undated  Fragments 146 

BEYOND  THE  VEIL 150 

Endeavor  161 


THE  WALK  WITH  GOD 


THE  WORD 

Had  I  one  of  thy  words,  my  Master, 
With  a  spirit  and  tone  of  thine, 

I  would  run  to  the  farthest  Indies 
To  scatter  the  joy  divine. 

I  would  waken  the  frozen  ocean 
With  a  billowy  burst  of  joy; 

Stir  the  ships  at  their  grim  ice-moorings 
The  summer  passes  by. 

I  would  enter  court  and  hovel, 

Forgetful  of  mien  or  dress, 
With  a  treasure  that  all  should  ask  for, 

An  errand  that  all  should  bless. 

I  seek  for  thy  words,  my  Master, 
With  a  spelling  vexed  and  slow; 

With  scanty  illuminations, 
And  an  alphabet  of  woe. 

But  while  I  am  searching,  scanning 

A  lesson  none  ask  to  hear, 
My  life  writeth  out  thy  sentence 

Divinely  just  and  dear. 

JULIA  WARD  HOWE. 


THE  JOURNAL 
1864 

January  ifth.  I  said  to  myself  last  night, 
"While  there  is  God,  there  is  hope." 

January  30th.  This  day  I  feel  a  clearer  pur 
pose  than  ever  before  to  try  to  do  every  day  with 
some  system  what  will  be  best  for  all,  all  things 
considered. 

March  i8th.  Let  me  here  put  on  record  that 
I  prefer  the  poorest  and  meanest  man  who  has 
a  moral  sense  and  follows  it,  to  the  most  brilliant 
and  gallant  personage  who  either  lacks  or  violates 
the  same.  I  ask  nothing  for  my  son  but  that  he 
may  keep  his  thought  unpoisoned  by  inflammatory 
ideas  and  his  heart  free  from  that  venom  of 
falsity  which  is  the  inevitable  companion  of  self 
ishness  carried  to  its  highest  power.  Yet  every 
man  stands  or  falls  to  his  own  Master.  We  can 
only  judge  of  what  compels  our  approbation  or 
our  dis-esteem.  The  absolute  moral  value  of  the 
man  is  unknown  to  us.  God  forbid  that  any  of 
us  should  be  judged  at  our  worst,  even  by  high 
human  justice. 

April  i8th.  Modesty  is  as  much  shown  in  our 
judgments  of  others  as  in  our  judgment  of  our 
selves. 

3 


THE   WALK   WITH    GOD 

June  1 2th.  This  service  (of  the  Greek 
church)  seemed  very  primitive  in  comparison 
with  ours.  It  is  a  sacrifice  to  God,  instead  of 
a  lesson  from  Him,  which,  after  all,  makes  the 
difference  between  the  old  religions  and  the  true 
Christian.  For  even  Judaism  is  heathen  com 
pared  with  Christianity.  Yet  I  found  this  very 
consoling,  feeling  out  the  varieties  of  religious 
development.  I  seemed  to  hear  in  the  responses 
a  great  harmony  in  which  the  first  man  had  the 
extreme  bass,  and  the  last  born  babe  the  extreme 
treble. 

September  30th.  My  theory  of  Limitation 
must  teach  me  not  to  lament  when  one  pleasure, 
like  that  of  the  summer  life,  etc.,  comes  to  end. 
I  must  also  particularly  learn  what  I  have  so 
often  enforced  in  writing,  viz.,  to  fall  back  upon 
pleasures  that  do  not  pass,  at  least  upon  satisfac 
tions. 


1865 

March  27th.  "I  am  God,"  says  the  fool.  "I 
see  God,"  says  the  wise  man.  For  while  you  are 
your  own  supreme,  you  are  your  own  God,  and 
self-worship  is  true  atheism. 

Let  us  be  always  mindful  of  two  things,  perfec 
tion  and  imperfection.  The  first,  we  worship, 
the  second,  we  are.  Law  is  the  iron  framework 
that  holds  the  fluent  universe. 

May  7th.  A  religion  is  a  turning  primarily  to 
God  for  inspiration  and  secondarily  to  our  fellow 
men  for  service.  Criticism  of  others  rarely  leads 
men  to  reform  themselves. 

May  2 1 st.  Let  me  record  from  my  experience 
that  you  must  never,  if  you  wish  to  raise  the 
moral  tone  of  a  person,  dwell  upon  his  past  faults. 
You  must,  on  the  contrary,  help  him  to  lose  the 
whole  frame  of  mind  of  which  they  were  a  part 
and  a  consequence.  With  a  person  recovering 
from  insanity,  you  would  never  seek  to  keep  in 
view  the  evidences  of  his  former  state  of  mind. 
These  would  always  tend  to  prolong  the  morbid 
action  which  must  be  broken  up  in  order  to  pro 
duce  cure.  Newness  of  heart  is  a  good  phrase. 

May  30th.  Unitarianism  is  critical,  not  dog 
matic;  regulative,  not  constitutive.  All  positive 
points  of  belief  it  has  in  common  with  all  other 
Christian  sects.  It  is  more  important  in  its  in 
fluence  on  other  sects  than  noticeable  as  a  sect.  I 

5 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

value  it  above  measure,  but  at  the  same  time  rec 
ognize  that  the  ideal  church  is  not  in  one  de 
nomination,  but  in  all. 

June  gth.  Let  me  never  go  back  from  use  to 
pleasure.  If  this  remain  only  a  silent  passive 
prayer,  it  is  better  to  keep  it  in  this  shape  than  not 
at  all.  But  I  believe  that  things  will  open  up 
for  me. 

June  20th.  If  men  must  have  toys,  let  us 
give  them  cats,  dogs,  horses,  but  not  women.  For 
the  toy  usage  has  gone  far  to  spoil  all  others. 

October  6th.  The  Sunday's  devotion  without 
the  week's  thought  and  use  is  a  spire  without  a 
meetinghouse.  It  leaps  upward,  but  crowns  and 
covers  nothing. 

I  have  too  often  set  down  the  moral  weight  I 
have  to  carry,  and  frisked  around  it.  But  the 
voice  now  tells  me  that  I  must  bear  it  to  the  end, 
or  lose  it  forever. 


6 


1866 

January  7th.  There  is  neither  more  nor  less 
in  God.  He  is  absolute  good,  whenever  we  con 
template  Him,  whether  for  a  moment  or  a  cen 
tury.  The  more  we  contemplate  Him,  the  more 
we  enjoy  of  His  good.  But  in  itself  it  changes 
neither  quantitatively  nor  qualitatively.  The 
talents  (in  Christ's  parable)  then  signify  the 
multiplication  of  human  powers  by  their  efficient 
use.  The  one  penny  of  reward  symbolizes  the 
divine  gift  which  is  always  the  same,  the  differ 
ence  existing  in  its  recipients. 

January    I4th.     preached    a    sermon 

on  the  supremacy  of  Christ  which  made  me 
cry  out  "Preserve  us  from  our  friends."  For  he 
failed  to  distinguish  the  true  philosophical  ele 
ment  of  the  identity  of  direction  of  truth  which 
is  absolute.  In  human  knowledge  a  small  pro 
portion  of  such  truth  is  mingled  with  a  much 
greater  proportion  of  relative  truth  and  absolute 
error.  The  quantitative  limitation  of  our  knowl 
edge  does  not  lower  the  qualitative  value  and  ab 
soluteness  of  this,  its  smallest  and  most  precious 
portion.  This  is  the  leaven  that  leaveneth  the 
whole  lump.  But  this  absolute  truth  is  what  im 
parts  dignity  to  its  possessors,  not  they  to  it. 
Truth  makes  Christ  great,  not  he  it.  Truth  also 
made  Moses  and  Plato  great.  If  they  had  less 
truth  than  Christ,  they  were  the  less  great.  But 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

truth  is  none  the  less  supreme ;  and  though  all  our 
knowledge  be  in  itself  relative  and  limited,  the 
recognition  of  absolute  truth  is  the  foundation  of 
human  thought,  and  the  pursuit  and  verification 
of  this  recognition  makes  the  difference  of  value 
between  one  man  and  another. 

January  i6th.  While  we  are  inwardly  under 
the  dominion  of  our  passions  and  outwardly  un 
der  the  fear  of  ordinances,  we  are  slaves  both  to 
law  and  to  passion.  But  when  our  reason  volun 
tarily  consents  to  the  moral  law,  we  are  free  alike 
from  the  outward  ordinance,  which  is  no  longer 
the  power  that  restrains  us,  and  from  the  inward 
slavery  of  our  own  ungoverned  impulses.  Per 
haps  liberty  is  intelligent  and  voluntary  obedi 
ence. 

March  nth.  I  have  written  somewhere: 
"Good  is  a  direction — virtue  is  a  habit."  The 
first  I  still  think  true ;  the  second  Kant  will  not 
allow.  ...  I  suppose  that  the  victories  of  prin 
ciple  in  the  struggles  of  our  lives  require  virtue. 
She  does  not  derange  good  habits,  but  she  does 
not  rest  in  them. 

May  27th.  I  have  little  to  show  for  the  past 
year's  work,  having  produced  no  work  of  any 
length,  and  read  but  little  in  public.  The  doc 
trine  of  the  seed  does,  however,  encourage  us  to 
continue  our  small  efforts.  The  most  effectual 
quickening  of  society  is  through  that  small  still  in- 
8 


THE   WALK   WITH    GOD 

fluence  which  creeps  like  the  leaven  through  the 
dough. 

All  religions  derive  so  largely  from  the  rever 
ence  paid  to  ancestors  that  I  am  convinced  that 
this  impulse  of  man  is  a  very  important  element  of 
his  religious  capacity  and  culture.  The  Greek 
mythologies  seem  to  me  to  be  made  up  of  the 
worship  of  wonderful  ancestors.  For  all  that 
was  distinguished  in  Greece  claimed  descent  from 
god,  demi-god,  or  hero  (the  trinity  of  Greek 
theology).  Roman  piety  was  duteous  care  of 
one's  relatives.  It  follows  from  this  that  the 
disregard  of  parents  and  elders  common  in  Amer 
ica,  is  in  itself  an  irreligious  trait,  and  one  which 
education  should  sedulously  correct.  It  is  a  con 
tingent,  not  a  logical  result  of  our  institutions, 
and  though  generated  by  them  tends  to  their 
overthrow. 

The  directness  of  moral  aims  and  the  indirect 
ness  of  moral  results.  In  the  faith  in  which  I 
live  and  worship,  there  seems  to  me  to  be  a 
straight  road  from  the  pulpit  through  the  whole 
domain  of  business  and  politics,  to  the  battlefield. 
One  banner  is  carried  all  the  way,  one  hymn  re 
sounds  from  end  to  end,  one  prayer  comes  from 
the  preacher  and  is  handed  down  and  accepted 
through  the  ranks.  But  in  the  opposite  wing, 
the  path  from  the  pulpit  is  devious,  winding,  and 
often  lost.  The  true  flag  is  viewed  from  a  distance, 
poor  imitations  taking  its  place  lower  down, 
which  deform  its  image  more  and  more.  And 
these  in  the  ranks  are  separated  from  the  pulpit 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

and  get  only  symbols  for  truths,  and  repeat  ob 
servances,  instead  of  studying  out  meanings. 

June  3rd.  Have  been  thinking  lately  that 
lust  is  more  cruel  than  hate,  and  that  luxury  ic 
the  father  of  cruelty.  To  refuse  onself  nothing 
leads  to  sins  of  commission.  To  constrain  one 
self  in  nothing  leads  to  sins  of  omission.  From 
these  naturally  follow  offense  of  the  rights  of 
others  and  neglect  of  duties  towards  them.  The 
Martha  and  Mary  of  the  New  Testament  are 
domestic  types  of  the  natural  order  and  the  moral 
order.  Martha  is  bowed  beneath  the  necessities 
of  the  one,  Mary  is  inspired  by  the  objects  of  the 
other.  Theologians  are  puzzled  between  them, 
sometimes  feeling  the  necessity  of  both,  and  not 
knowing  how  to  reconcile  the  two. 

Sceptics  do  not  find  fault  with  the  conception 
of  a  first  cause,  but  with  dogmatic  insistence  upon 
the  ability  of  human  authority  to  understand  its 
features,  explain  its  modus  operandi  with  ab 
solute  statement,  .  .  .  where  all  our  processes 
of  thought  become  negative  and  inferential. 
The  dogmatism  of  the  church  has,  however,  this 
excuse.  Belief  is  a  positive,  doubt  a  negative. 
Belief  is  efficient,  doubt  abstains  from  all  but 
destructive  action.  A  mistaken  belief  compared 
to  the  emptiness  of  indifference  is  as  plus  to 
minus.  Therefore,  the  clergy,  measuring  dis 
belief  against  belief,  assume  an  absolute  value  in 
favor  of  the  latter,  which,  under  these  circum 
stances,  cannot  be  disallowed.  The  doubt  which 
10 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

heralds  in  reform  is  not  scepticism,  but  devout 
distrust  of  existing  institutions  and  belief  in  prin 
ciples  which  they  inadequately  represent. 

November  nth.  We  must  worship  what  Jesus 
worshiped.  This  was  not  himself.  There  are 
three  aspects  in  each  of  us,  the  natural  or  empir 
ical  self,  the  ideal  or  rational  self,  and  the  actual 
or  experimental  self.  The  larger  the  develop 
ment  of  the  individual,  the  more  clearly  can  we 
make  out  the  three  elements.  This  is  the  Three- 
hood  which  the  human  has,  unavoidably  perhaps, 
projected  upon  the  divine. 

December  i8th.  The  worship  of  Christ, 
however  natural  and  useful  in  its  time,  has  sure 
ly,  after  a  certain  time,  tended  to  distract  the 
attention  of  people  from  the  study  of  his  doc 
trine  and  careful  following  of  his  precepts.  They 
say,  "Lord,  Lord,"  and  think  they  have  per 
formed  a  religious  act. 


11 


1867 

January  4th.  The  individuality  of  Christian 
ity  is  moral  and  intensive.  It  is  an  inward  ex 
perience,  not  an  outward  assertion. 

January  gth.  Thought  of  a  good  essay  on  the 
deceitfulness  of  riches,  showing  that  the  good 
rich  man  holds  all  his  wealth  subject  to  the 
demands  of  all  who  need  it  more  than  he  does. 

The  world  is  all  illusion  if  we  have  not 
truth  in  ourselves.  Virtue  makes  wise  because 
her  name  implies  an  unending  series  of  exper 
iments  founded  on  just  principles. 

January  I4th.  Humanity  itself  is  only  rep 
resentative,  the  two  sexes  are  its  two  terms,  the 
ideal  of  humanity  the  third,  explaining  and  in 
cluding  the  two  others.  Hence  men  and  women 
are  not  properly  compared  with  each  other,  but 
with  that  ideal  which  the  two  are  bound  to  rep 
resent,  and  which  difference  of  constitution  en 
ables  the  man  to  represent  in  one  way,  the  woman 
in  another.  Hence,  in  another  way,  the  defect' 
of  the  Pharisee's  prayer.  He  compared  himself 
with  the  Publican  and  found  himself  superior, 
but  the  Publican  compared  himself  with  the 
divine  standard  and  found  himself  wanting. 
Therefore,  the  exercise  of  prayer,  which  in  the 
one  resulted  in  self-assertion,  in  the  other  re 
sulted  in  humiliation  and  self-rejection,  and  so 
the  one  profited  and  the  other  did  not. 

12 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

After  bestirring  ourselves  to  elect  those  who 
are  to  represent  us,  it  becomes  us  to  elect  what 
we  ourselves  will  represent,  whether  justice  and 
progress,  charity,  mercy  and  effort,  or  sloth,  lux 
ury,  and  self-indulgence.  For  our  lives  are  after 
all  only  figures  of  what  we  intend.  Our  repre 
sentation  can  be  either  strenuous  and  sincere,  or 
careless  and  hypocritical.  Its  intellectual  grasp 
is  measured  for  us  by  nature,  its  moral  appro 
priateness  and  efficiency  is  determined  by  our 
own  will  exercised  at  once  in  energy  and  discrimi 
nation. 

February  6th.     Freedom  is  God's  equalizer. 

May  26th.  To  desire  supremely  ends  which 
are  incompatible  with  no  one's  happiness,  and 
which  promote  the  good  of  all — this,  even  as  an 
ideal,  is  a  great  gain  over  the  small  and  eager 
covetousness  of  personal  desires.  Religion  gives 
this  steadfast  standard,  whose  pursuit  is  happi 
ness.  Therefore,  let  him  who  seeks  religion  be 
glad  that  he  seeks  the  only  true  good,  of  which 
indeed  we  constantly  fail,  and  yet  in  seeking  it, 
are  constantly  renewed. 

November  24th.  A  disappointment  should  be 
digested  in  patience,  not  vomited  in  spleen.  Bit 
ter  morsels  nourish  the  soul  not  less  perhaps  than 
sweet. 

Moral  philosophy  begins  with  the  fact  of  ac 
cepting  human  life. 

13 


1868 

Wednesday,  January  1st.  May  I  this  year 
have  energy,  patience,  goodwill  and  good  faith. 
May  I  be  guilty  of  no  treason  against  duty  and 
my  best  self.  May  I  acquire  more  system,  or 
der  and  wisdom  in  the  use  of  things.  May  I, 
if  God  wills,  carry  out  some  of  my  plans  for 
making  my  studies  useful  to  others.  This  is 
much  to  ask,  but  not  too  much  of  Him  who 
giveth  all. 

Sunday,  January  26th.  Some  mental  trou 
bles  have  ended  in  a  determination  to  hold  fast 
till  death  the  liberty  wherewith  Christ  has  made 
me  free.  The  joyous  belief  that  his  doctrine 
of  influence  can  keep  me  from  all  that  I  should 
most  greatly  dread  lifts  me  up  like  a  pair  of 
strong  wings.  "I  shall  run  and  not  be  weary. 
I  shall  walk  and  not  faint."  At  church  the  first 
hymn  contained  these  lines:  "Her  fathers'  God 
before  her  moved — "  which  quite  impressed  me; 
for  my  father's  piety  and  the  excellence  of  other 
departed  relatives  have  always  of  late  years  been 
a  support  and  pledge  to  me  of  my  own  good 
behavior. 

Saturday,  February  1st.  Oh,  Master,  in  this 
new  month  forsake  me  not.  Thou  knowest  my 
present  great  need.  Let  me,  dear  Master,  lose 
all  but  Thee,  for  Thou  art  all  to  have  or  to  lose. 

Sunday,  February  2nd.  Church  was  blessed. 
Prayer  and  sermon  equally  dear.  In  petition 

14 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

for  those  we  love  and  against  temptation  my 
heart  equally  joined.  .  .  .  My  heart  uplifts 
itself  in  hope  not  to  be  divided  by  any  personal 
seeking  from  the  great  army  of  good  and  faith 
ful  souls.  The  single  eye,  the  single  love — if 
Christ  has  taught  anything  he  has  taught  the 
necessity  of  purity  and  sincerity  of  aim  to  char 
acter.  We  do  not  serve  God  with  the  mammon 
of  our  own  vanities  and  other  passions.  I  write 
this  personal  record  at  this  moment  because  I 
wish  to  remember  at  this  time  its  efforts  and  its 
lessons. 

The  thief's  heart,  the  wanton's  brow,  may  ac 
company  high  talent  and  geniality  of  tempera 
ment,  but,  thanks  be  to  God,  they  need  not. 

Sunday,  March  2Qth.  I  have  heard  the  true 
word  of  God  to-day  from  Frederick  Hedge — a 
sermon  on  Love  as  the  true  bond  of  society, 
which  lifted  my  weak  soul  as  on  the  strong 
wings  of  a  cherub.  The  immortal  truths  easily 
lost  sight  of  in  our  every-day  weakness  and  pas 
sion  stood  out  to-day  so  strong  and  clear  that  I 
felt  their  healing  power  as  if  Christ  had  stood 
and  touched  my  blinded  eyes  with  his  divine  fin 
ger.  So  be  it  always !  Est o  perpetual 

Monday,  March  30th.  Thought  at  break 
fast  of  Christ's  beautiful  prayer  about  his  dis 
ciples,  especially  of  the  words,  "I  pray  not  that 
thou  shouldst  take  them  out  of  the  world,  but 
that  thou  shouldst  keep  them  from  the  evil."  I 

15 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

desire,  my  dear  Lord  and  Master,  to  remember 
this  prayer  as  if  it  had  been  made  for  me.  I 
pray  that  the  divine  echo  of  yesterday's  sermon 
may  follow  me  through  the  week.  Let  me 
learn  truths  that  I  have  not  known  before,  and 
endure  patiently  pain  that  I  bring  upon  myself. 
So  Thy  will  be  done,  dear  Master,  and  if  unable 
to  do  it  let  me  suffer  it  sincerely. 

Sunday,  April  12th.  A  lovely  Easter  sermon, 
the  Resurrection  or  going  up  of  Christ  typical  of 
the  raising  of  the  soul  from  things  sensible  to 
things  spiritual.  .  .  .  J.  F.  C.  (The  Rev. 
James  Freeman  Clarke,  pastor  of  the  Church  of 
the  Disciples)  from  this  sermon  obviously  be 
lieves  the  appearances  of  Christ  after  death  to 
have  been  fact,  not  a  fancy.  While  he  made  it 
edifying  and  inspiriting  to  us  I  still  feel  that 
the  significance  of  the  occurrence,  not  its  actu 
ality,  is  important.  I  felt  more  hopeful  and  up 
lifted  than  in  many  days  past.  Let  me  not  fail 
of  my  Easter  Resurrection,  O  Thou  great  Help 
of  human  hearts! 

(After  a  period  of  mental  conflict) 
August  1 5th,  1868 

My  divine  Master,  receive,  I  pray  Thee,  the 
thoughts  and  intentions  of  this  day  as  the  fresh 
starting  towards  a  career  of  renewed  zeal  and 
effort.  The  period  just  passed  has  left  few  rec 
ords  on  these  pages.  Afflicted  by  its  faults,  I 
16 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

yet  leave  its  sum  and  settlement  in  Thy  hands. 
I  only  ask  that  from  this  moment  I  may  seek  with 
greater  directness  and  pray  with  greater  fervor, 
and  that  nothing  may  withhold  me  from  truly 
endeavoring  in  energetic  and  useful  life,  wrong 
ing  no  man  and  leaving  the  fulfillment  of  no 
duty  unattempted.  In  the  year  so  far  past  I 
have  done  good  and  also  evil,  of  which  the  meas 
ure  is  better  known  to  Thee  than  to  me.  Of 
both  my  heart  can  only  speak  directly  to  Thee 
without  the  expression  and  limitation  of  words. 
My  testimony  is  only  that  without  Thee  life  has 
no  divine  moments,  only  poor  enjoyments  and 
burning  recollections.  But  in  Thy  presence 
grief  is  changed  to  glory,  and  this  presence  and 
benediction  I  implore  of  Thee,  not  out  of  desert 
but  out  of  need.  O  Thou  unspeakable  One 
who  nearest  my  unspoken  shrift,  withdraw  not 
Thy  fatherly  instruction  from  me,  but  teach  me 
true  and  great  lessons,  even  if  bitter  ones. 

So  much  utterance  I  allow  my  heart;  now  no 
more  speech,  but  work,  and  true  service,  if  I  can 
find  it  and  perform  it. 


1870 
(TO  CERTAIN  MISSIONARIES) 

Ye  are  they  to  whom  Christ  said, 
"Give  your  service  for  my  need, 

Let  your  blood  be  fairly  shed, 
Where  on  blood  my  foes  must  feed. 

"If  the  hand  that  guards  the  right 
Or  the  eye,  your  fate  require, 

Yield  your  prowess,  yield  your  sight 
To  the  all  avenging  fire." 

Now  the  scathing  fire  is  quenched 
And  your  bloom  is  withered  too, 

Torn  and  agonized  and  wrenched, 
You  your  halting  way  pursue. 

But  the  Highest  shall  requite 
All  your  faithfulness  and  love, 

Spirit  powers  come  for  sight, 
Angels'  wings  the  lame  man  move. 


18 


1871 

January  2Oth.  Had  a  divine  glimpse  this  day 
between  daylight  and  dusk  of  something  like  this : 
A  beautiful  person,  splendidly  dressed,  entering 
the  gay  theatre,  as  I  have  often  done  with  entire 
delight  and  forgetfulness  of  everything  else,  and 
the  restraining  hand  of  Christ  holding  me  back 
in  the  outer  darkness,  the  want  and  woe  of  the 
world,  and  saying:  "The  true  drama  of  life  is 
here"  Oh!  that  restraining  hand  had  in  it  the 
true  touch,  communicating  knowledge  of  human 
sorrow  and  zeal  for  human  service.  Never  may 
I  escape  it,  to  my  grave! 

May  22nd.  There  is  much  controversy  to-day 
as  to  what  of  truth  came  into  the  world  with 
Christianity  and  what  was  already  present  there. 
This  dispute  seems  to  me  futile  so  soon  as  it  is 
carried  beyond  the  politeness  of  culture,  the  full 
ness  of  study.  The  elements  of  human  nature 
were  in  it  from  the  first,  as  we  declare  when  we 
say  that  God  made  man  in  His  own  image.  It 
had  always  the  animal  and  spiritual,  the  selfish 
and  angelic  sides,  but  that  Christianity  is  the  re 
ligion  of  peace  and  goodwill  to  all  mankind,  no 
body  can  deny.  Peace  is  Christian,  war  is 
heathen.  Let  those  of  us  who  choose  to  believe 
in  Christianity  remember  this.  There  can  be  no 
"most  Christian"  butcher.  No  despot,  temporal 
or  spiritual,  can  represent  the  dogma  and  author 
ity  of  Christ. 

19 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

June  idth.  On  Sunday  we  bring  back  the 
worn  and  dim  currency  of  our  active  life  to  be 
redeemed  by  the  pure  gold  of  the  supreme  wis 
dom.  I  bring  to  church  my  coppers  and  small 
pieces  and  take  away  a  shining  gold  piece.  Self 
is  the  talent  buried  in  the  napkin — no  matter 
with  how  much  of  culture  and  natural  capacity. 
Till  we  get  out  of  self  we  are  in  the  napkin. 
Hospitable  entertainment  of  other  people's  opin 
ions,  brotherly  promotions  of  their  interests — 
these  acts  make  our  five  talents  ten  in  use  to 
others  and  in  enjoyment  and  profit  to  ourselves. 

June  i8th.  We  never  can  have  the  fact  of 
the  Holy  Catholic  Church  without  overcoming 
the  exclusive  pretensions  of  single  sects,  no  mat 
ter  how  numerous,  to  be  the  whole  of  that  of 
which  they  are  only  a  part.  This  antagonism  is 
kept  up  by  the  theological  method  of  present 
ing  always  the  points  of  difference,  instead  of 
the  points  of  agreement.  Thus  religious  war, 
like  military,  is  kept  up  by  the  sheer  force  of 
despotism.  If  the  agreement  on  great  and  car 
dinal  doctrines  of  religion  were  kept  in  sight,  the 
differences  of  sects  would  be  lost  sight  of  in  their 
sympathy.  Women  ought  to  be  able  to  help  in 
this. 

Antagonisms  of  politics,  creeds  and  literature. 
The  murderous  desire  for  wealth — the  bandits 
of  Wall  Street  and  the  Bourse.  Cannot  women 
intervene  in  business  on  a  basis  of  absolute  hon 
esty  ?  "I  am  not  a  millionaire,  but  I  have  plun- 
20 


THE    WALK    WITH    GOD 

clered  nobody.  I  have  taken  the  slow  and  small 
percentage  of  honest  trade."  In  this  connection, 
a  sermon  on  the  five  talents  gaining  other  five,  the 
real  gain  of  industry.  Also,  "a  crown  incor 
ruptible."  The  civic  crown  of  the  pure  citizen, 
man  or  woman. 

July  gth.  Samuel  Bloomfield  interprets  the 
well-known  text,  "He  that  hath  not,  from  him 
shall  be  taken  even  that  which  he  hath,"  to  refer 
simply  to  the  finances  of  the  poor,  which  tend 
constantly  to  decrease,  as  those  of  the  capitalist 
tend  to  increase.  But  in  the  connection  in  which 
Christ  says  this,  it  seems  to  me  much  rather  to 
apply  to  the  use  of  doctrine.  He  who  does  not 
use  doctrine  spiritually,  loses  what  he  has,  i.e., 
gets  no  instruction  from  it.  Thus  there  is  no 
spiritual  possession  without  spiritual  progress. 
Christ  seems  to  admonish  the  disciples  of  this 
when  he  says  that  saints  of  old  desired  to  see  his 
time,  and  were  not  allowed  to  see  it,  i.e.,  human 
generations  must  abide  the  unfolding  of  human 
culture  and  civilization.  Prophetic  souls  could 
dream  of  the  great  advances  of  the  race,  and 
dreaming,  could  suggest  them,  but  they  could  not 
bring  the  desired  time  until  the  race  itself  was 
ready  for  it. 

English  Christianity  too  muscular  and  too 
hard,  not  soft  enough  for  the  purposes  of  the 
human  heart.  On  the  battlefield,  amid  the  crash 
of  war,  Western  Christianity  offers  prayers  to 
God  that  thousands  of  men  may  be  slaughtered 

21 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

and  butchered.     That  is  not  the  right  sort  of 
Christianity. 

I  have  pointed  out  the  difference  between  the 
spirit  of  Christ  and  the  dogmas  of  Christianity, 
between  the  profession  of  Christianity  and  the 
inward  growth  of  Christ's  life  in  'the  soul.  I 
have  said  that  to  be  a  Christian  means  only  to 
be  Christ-like. 

August  1 4th.  God  is  not  the  God  of  the 
dead,  but  of  the  living.  "I  come  not  to  destroy, 
but  to  fulfill."  Liberal  thought  fulfills.  Free 
dom  can  fulfill  Christianity,  which  absolutism 
would  always  kill. 

August  i8th.  The  natural  unfolding  of  re 
form.  "His  purposes  will  ripen  fast."  Provi 
dence  does  not  plant  so  as  to  gather  all  of  its 
crops  in  one  day ;  first  the  flowers,  then  the  fruits, 
then  the  golden  grain. 

August  30th.  "Freely  ye  have  received,  freely 
give."  What  I  have  received  on  this  island  (i.e., 
Newport,  Rhode  Island).  What  country  people 
receive.  What  the  country  has  received.  What 
women  have  received.  What  and  how  we  must 
give.  People  don't  know  how  much  they  know, 
that  is  the  secret  of  ignorance;  don't  know  how 
much  they  have,  that  is  the  secret  of  discontent. 

We  must  not  cut  the  webs  of  Providence. 
We  must  disentangle  them. 

22 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

September  i6th.  The  Son  of  Man  is  come  to 
seek  and  to  save  that  which  was  lost.  What  the 
lost  things  are,  which  the  Son  of  Man  came  to 
save.  Lost  values,  lost  jewels,  scattered  souls, 
darkened  powers,  lost  opportunities. 

September  I'jth.  Jesus  said  to  the  multitude, 
"The  scribes  and  Pharisees  sit  in  Moses'  seat. 
All,  therefore,  whatsoever  they  bid  you  observe, 
that  observe  and  do.  But  do  not  ye  after  their 
works,  for  they  say  and  do  not."  Nice  discrimi 
nation  between  sacred  authority  and  its  minis 
ters.  Revere  the  doctrine,  avoid  the  unworthy 
example. 


1872 

March  3 1 st.  True  religion  must  ever  be  tol 
erant.  If  God  speaks  to  me,  He  can  also  speak 
to  you.  Unity  a  thing  of  completeness,  founded 
not  upon  uniformity,  but  upon  harmony. 

April  roth.  Great  God,  do  not  let  me  desert 
Thee !  For  that  is  the  trouble.  Thou  dost  not 
desert  us. 

April  28th.  Have  been  thinking  for  some 
days  of  a  sermon  illustrating  the  difference  be 
tween  the  mechanical  and  the  moral  in  human 
life.  Text,  "the  first  man  Adam  was  a  living 
soul."  Uncertain  whether  I  should  include  the 
next  sentence  or  not.  Many  people  never  get 
out  of  the  mechanism,  never  attain  to  the  con 
sciousness  of  freedom,  which  is  a  high  moral 
fact.  Circumstances  and  passions,  things  from 
without  and  within,  administer  them.  They  do 
not  kno;v  their  own  power  over  these  things. 
The  various  mechanisms,  logical,  passional,  etc. 
A  good  subject,  if  I  can  study  it  out.  "The 
Lord  said  unto  my  Lord"  might  be  used  against 
the  pretensions  of  birth. 

May  I4th.  The  wind  bloweth  where  it  list- 
eth.  The  church  is  wrong  in  prescribing  what 
people  should  believe.  Moses  and  Christ  did 
not  do  this.  The  church  laid  down  the  channels 
of  faith,  and  faith  forsook  them.  Aristocracy 
24 


THE   WALK   WITH    GOD 

prescribed  what  channels  nobility  should  run  in, 
and  it  often  forsook  them.  The  tares  and  the 
wheat — the  good  and  the  evil  in  institutions  have 
to  grow  together.  When  the  good  is  ripe,  God's 
providence  destroys  the  tares;  this  about  the  use 
of  war  in  bringing  order  and  discipline:  blood 
shed  and  violence  the  tares.  Now  the  wheat  is 
ripe  and  we  may  dispense  with  the  tares. 

(After  a  long  absence  from  home) 

August  ist.  Every  break  in  our  long-con 
tinued  habits  shows  us  something  to  amend  in 
our  past  lives.  What  do  I  see  in  mine  after 
this  long  break  ?  That  I  must  endeavor  to  have 
more  real  life  and  more  religion.  The  passive 
and  contemplative  following  of  thought,  my  own 
or  other  people's,  must  not  de-energize  my  sym 
pathies  and  my  will.  I  must  daily  consult  the 
Divine  will  and  standard  which  can  help  us  to 
mold  our  lives  aright,  without  running  from 
one  extreme  to  another.  My  heart's  wish  would 
now  be  to  devote  myself  to  some  sort  of  religious 
ministry.  God  can  open  a  way  for  this,  in  which 
the  spirit  of  my  desire  can  receive  the  form  of 
His  will. 

August  25th.  "And  the  whole  multitude 
sought  to  touch  him,  for  there  went  virtue  out 
of  him  and  healed  them  all." 

The  superstition  of  the  miraculous  act  instead 
of  the  miraculous  influence.  Something  true  in 


THE   WALK   WITH    GOD 

this  impulse  nevertheless.  Mere  hearing  of  the 
word  is  not  enough.  We  desire  personal  (not 
physical)  contact,  with  those  who  possess  it. 
Doubtless,  this  high  healing  influence  did  go  out 
of  Jesus,  but  not  more,  I  believe,  on  those  who 
touched  him  than  on  those  who  did  not.  His 
touching  them  was  the  true  point.  Those  whom 
his  word  and  present  influence  touched,  they  no 
doubt  were  healed.  How  to  seek  and  find  to 
day  this  personal  contact  with  Jesus.  To  meet 
the  multitude  of  men  as  he  did,  not  for  our  own 
glory,  but  for  their  good.  This  would  put  us 
in  his  position.  We  might  then  find  in  our 
selves  a  little  of  that  divining  power  by  which 
his  help  went  straight  to  those  who  needed  it 
most.  We  could  touch  Jesus  at  this  point  of 
faith  and  endeavor.  Healing  would  then  follow, 
in  the  measure  of  our  capacity  for  it. 

"Woe  unto  you  that  are  rich,  for  ye  have  re 
ceived  your  consolation.  Woe  unto  you  that  are 
full,  for  ye  shall  hunger.  Woe  unto  you  that 
laugh  now,  for  ye  shall  mourn  and  weep."  What 
are  these  woes  ?  The  rich  are  delighted  with  ex 
ternal  riches.  The  full  are  filled  with  thoughts 
and  things  which  have  no  satisfaction  in  them. 
Those  who  deride  the  truth  will  weep  and 
mourn  its  power  later. 

September  I2th.     God  knows  best,  who  gives 

different  gifts   to   different   people.     But   if   to 

have  money,  one  must  love  it,  rather  let  me  and 

mine  love  and  have  the  better  things,  so  that,  as 

26 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

a  family,  we  pay  our  debts,  educate  our  children, 
and  hand  down  unimpaired  and  a  little  aug 
mented  our  moral  and  spiritual  inheritance. 

October  ijth.  Have  been  reading  F.  P. 
Cobbe's  book,  "Broken  Lights,"  a  book  showing 
much  thought,  piety  and  study;  but  at  times  she 
falls  from  her  high  and  just  argument  to  a  lame 
and  false  conclusion.  1  note  this  at  the  end  of 
Chapter  VII  where  she  says  of  Christianity,  "Let 
it  pass  away,  that  grand  and  wonderful  faith." 
As  well  might  she  say,  "Let  arithmetic  and  math 
ematics  pass  away." 


27 


1873 

January  ist.  Dear  Lord,  let  me  this  year  be 
worthy  to  call  upon  Thy  name ! 

January  ijth.  In  childhood  we  regard  things 
with  wonder,  in  youth  we  try  to  seize  them,  in 
old  age  we  sit  and  weigh  them.  We  women 
must  change  our  measures  as  well  as  our  weights, 
must  contemplate  this  whole  three  score  and  ten 
years  and  see  what  pattern  of  life  will  suit  this, 
not  cut  off  the  first  twenty  years  and  try  to  re 
peat  them. 

March  ist.  Went  to  Saturday  Morning 
Club.  Found  that  John  Fiske  had  failed  them. 
Was  told  to  improvise  a  lecture  on  the  spot. 
Did  so.  Spoke  to  the  girls  for  about  an  hour. 
Perhaps  never  did  better.  Told  them  not  to  get 
estranged  from  their  books  till  they  would  be 
afraid  of  them.  The  human  library,  which 
throws  its  books  at  you  whether  you  will  or  no. 
The  melancholy  left  by  novel  reading,  the  value 
of  a  little  Greek,  a  little  Latin,  history,  biogra 
phy — music,  the  unifying  power  of  art — the  audi 
ence  at  Symphony  Concert  goes  in  as  many  and 
comes  out  as  one. 

April  20th.     (Points  noted  from  a  sermon.) 

We  are  idle  because  we  do  not  know  what  is  to 

be  done.     How  did  Christ  know?     As  a  child, 

he  understood  the  difference  between  his  Father's 

28 


THE    WALK   WITH    GOD 

business  and  other  business.  The  loving  eyes 
with  which  he  looked  upon  the  world  made  him 
wise  as  to  its  need.  He  expresses  this  in  his 
words  to  Nicodemus,  "A  man  must  be  born 
again."  We  must  say  this  to  the  world.  Every 
generation  receives  its  natural  birth,  but  for  its 
spiritual  birth,  it  must  labor  and  suffer. 

July  1 3th.  Preached  on  the  parable  of  the 
talents.  "Well  done,  thou  good  and  faithful 
servant."  Said  that  self  was  the  napkin  in  which 
the  talent,  if  buried  and  laid  away,  became  use 
less  and  unfruitful.  The  envelope  of  self  was 
at  first  silken,  easy  every  way,  then  it  hardened 
to  iron,  like  a  shirt  of  mail,  then  it  became  ada 
mant,  which  only  the  sword  of  God's  spirit  can 
reach  and  break  through.  We  love  first  our 
selves,  next  our  possessions.  Christ  had  seen  the 
women  lament  over  the  moth-eaten  garments,  the 
silver  lost  or  stolen.  He  showed  the  treasure  in 
heaven  which  is  incorruptible.  Misfortunes  are 
talents,  gifts,  angels  in  disguise.  If  we  improve 
them,  we  are  enriched  by  them.  "The  redeemed1 
shall  walk  there."  God's  angel  of  peace  comes 
through  the  world,  finding  peace  nowhere.  God 
says:  "Go  again,  look  nearer,  see  the  homes  and 
hearts  in  which  the  spirit  of  My  Christ  has  en 
tered."  The  Angel  goes  again,  finds  peace 
springing  up  in  many  places.  Isaiah's  prophecy 
really  to  be  fulfilled  by  the  triumph  of  true 
Christianity.  "The  desert  shall  rejoice." 

It  seems  to  me  a  wonderful  thing  that  we  to- 

29 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

day  should  have  the  power  to  look  into  the  de 
vout  and  transparent  mind  of  Christ,  luminous 
with  spiritual  knowledge  and  insight,  to  see  there 
what  this  very  world  we  live  in  was  to  him.  He 
judged  its  cares,  vanities,  and  falsehoods  for  us, 
near  nineteen  hundred  years  ago,  and  solved  its 
problems  with  divine  insight  and  human  fore 
sight.  We  are  not  compelled  to  adopt  his  view, 
nor  indeed  can  we  value  his  thoughts,  unless  we 
think  ourselves;  but  oh!  how  much  are  our  lives 
impoverished,  if  we  leave  him  out ! 

"If  any  man  hear  my  words  and  believe  not, 
I  judge  him  not,  for  I  came  not  to  judge  the 
world  but  to  save  the  world."  How,  in  the  face 
of  this,  can  Christians  be  intolerant?  They  are 
in  haste  to  judge  the  world,  rather  than  to  save 
it.  What  does  save  the  world?  Love,  patience, 
and  wisdom,  not  uncharity  and  condemnation. 


THE  APOSTLES 

They  pass  from  sight,  those  men  of  power, 
The  planted  seed  of  God's  dear  field. 

In  martyrdom's  consummate  flower 
A  world-renewing  crop  they  yield. 

From  lowly  trade,  from  hours  sublime 
In  which  they  knew  the  Master's  love, 

From  prison  bonds  and  heathen  crime, 
Resistless  in  their  calm  they  move. 

The  heart  which  ran  its  own  wild  way, 
With  knowledge  of  recorded  good; 

Which  tarried  for  the  poet's  lay, 

And  loved,  though  wrong,  the  hero's  mood, 

From  all  the  songs  of  Greece  and  Rome, 
The  joys  and  woes  of  human  souls, 

Turns  to  the  truths  that  overcome, 
The  sacred  reason  which  controls. 

Twelve  lowly  men,  of  little  lore, 

With  human  fault  and  human  faith, 

Still  from  their  crowned  service  pour 
The  light  that  triumphs  over  death. 

Oh !  glory  of  man's  true  desert ! 

The  wilderness  is  glad  of  them, 
And  Nature,  healed  of  every  hurt, 

Bears  up  the  New  Jerusalem. 

31 


1874 

January  3ist.  This  month  ending  to-day 
seems  the  most  hurried  of  my  life.  .  .  .  Some 
times  I  have  felt  as  if  such  a  life  as  mine  was  of 
no  value  to  the  owner,  and  oftener  than  before 
prayer  has  not  seemed  to  bring  me  comfort. 

February  ijth.  (After  a  suffrage  hearing  at 
the  State  House.)  .  .  .  Spoke  of  our  move 
ment  in  the  line  of  Peace  and  progress,  and  did 
as  well  as  I  ever  did  in  my  life.  A  power  not 
my  own  seemed  to  hold  me  up,  that  of  the  anx 
ious,  earnest  hearts  before  me,  that  of  the  truth 
upon  me.  I  thank  God  for  this  occasion,  for  the 
good  words  of  others,  and  for  what  I  was  able 
to  do. 

March  i^th.  Santo  Domingo.  .  .  .  Remem 
bered  my  prayer  on  reaching  this  place  before. 
I  pray  God  now  no  less  than  then,  that  I 
may  do  something  to  deserve  this  great  pleas 
ure  of  visiting  the  tropics. 

March  22nd.  Sunday.  .  .  .  Studied  my 
sermon  over  a  good  deal.  .  .  .  My  text  was, 
"And  you  hath  He  quickened."  Quickening  of 
the  spring,  of  the  day,  of  the  spirit.  Our  rude 
knocking  at  the  door  of  heaven  is  prayer.  God's 
soft  whisper,  at  the  door  of  our  hearts.  "If  you 
are  willing,  I  will  come  in." 

March  23rd.  I  lay  down  last  evening  rather 
discouraged  about  my  sermon.  There  were 

32 


THE   WALK   WITH    GOD 

many  strangers  at  church  who  did  not  under 
stand  English  .  .  .  but  this  morning told 

me  that  the  people  who  did  understand  were 
much  comforted.  God  grant  that  I  may  help 
these  people  (Spanish  negroes)  still  more,  and 
do  something  to  build  up  education  among  them. 

April  7th.  Samana.  Up  early.  ...  I  took 
the  bull,  and  rode  astride,  safe,  but  uncomfort 
able.  .  .  .  The  schoolroom  serves  also  for  a 
chapel,  and  is  called  Bethsaida.  .  .  .  They 
asked  me  to  read  and  pray.  I  read  a  part  of 
the  chapter,  "He  that  entereth  into  the  sheep- 
fold,"  etc.  Prayed  for  Christ's  sheep  in  this 
wilderness.  It  was  a  good  moment. 

April  I2th.  Sunday.  My  first  preaching  at 
Samana.  I  had  the  same  text  as  at  Santo  Do 
mingo  City,  but  another  sermon.  In  this  I 
dwelt  upon  the  gradations  of  life  from  the  first 
creation  up  to  the  Christian  dispensation  and 
spiritual  quickening.  How  God  first  quickened 
the  earth  from  the  void,  then  vegetable  life,  then 
animal  life,  then  man,  then  Christian  doctrine 
and  influence.  Think  I  did  pretty  well. 

April  igth.  Sunday.  Preparing  for  my  af 
ternoon  preaching.  .  .  .  Text,  "Philip  said 
unto  him,  'Show  us  the  Father.'  "  Subject,  how 
Christ  showed  and  shows  the  Father.  Spiritual 
insight,  the  constant  presence,  etc. 

I  begin  to  realize  what  a  blessed  rest  the  time 

33 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

here  has  been  to  Chev  *  and  to  me.  The  very  ab 
sence  of  amusement  has  been  good.  It  has  been 
very  long  since  I  have  had  so  much  quiet  work 
of  the  sort  that  builds  up.  Nothing  that  I  have 
written  here  or  anywhere  gives  any  idea  of  the 
beauty  of  this  country.  It  is  the  very  sylvan  tem 
ple  of  God's  majesty,  indescribably  rich  and 
grand. 

April  26th.  Sunday.  At  work  on  sermon, 
Matt.  25:40:  "Inasmuch  as  ye  have  done  it 
unto  one  of  the  least  of  these  my  brethren." 
I  tried  to  show  first,  how  this  doctrine  equalizes 
the  opportunities  of  men  for  good  and  evil,  since 
they  can  always  do  good,  but  neglect  doing  it, 
to  others.  Second,  this  great  majesty  of  God 
which  feels  all  good  and  evil  done  to  its  meanest 
creatures  as  done  to  itself.  Third,  this  great 
championship  and  guardianship  which  God  has 
to  the  feeble  creatures  of  the  earth.  Fourth,  an 
exhortation  to  be  faithful  in  all  human  relations. 
I  did  not  feel  sure  that  my  audience  cared  much 
about  this  sermon,  but  it  cost  me  a  good  deal  of 
work.  My  prayer  afterward  seemed  to  touch 
some  of  them. 

May  27th.  Boston.  My  birthday — fifty-five 
years  old.  Still  face  to  face  with  the  mercies  of 
God  in  health  and  sanity,  enjoying  all  true  pleas 
ures  more  than  ever,  and  weaned  from  some  false 
ones. 

*Dr.  Howe. 
34 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

June  7th.  Swarthmore  College.  Pleasant, 
quiet,  solid  Swarthmore.  Here  I  am,  in  Quaker 
surroundings,  whose  restful  simplicity  is  most 
congenial  to  me.  I  feel  here  the  earnest  desire 
for  genuine  growth  and  culture  which  founds  a 
slow  but  sure  success.  I  am  confirmed  in  my  di 
vision  of  human  energies.  Ambitious  people 
climb,  but  faithful  people  build. 


1875 

January  I5th.  If  we  will  accept  and  im 
prove  the  gift  God  gives  us  in  ourselves,  we  shall 
not  have  room  or  time  for  envious  desires. 

March  1 4th.  On  my  way  to  the  hall  (Parker 
Fraternity,  where  she  was  to  preach)  I  thought, 
"If  any  one  asks  me  whether  I  love  preaching,  I 
shall  reply,  'Yes,  if  one  loves  child-birth,'  which 
on  this  wise  it  much  resembles." 

May  igth.  Woman  Suffrage  meeting  at 
Concord.  .  .  .  Was  billeted  on  the  dear  Emer- 
sons,  so  had  a  glimpse  of  paradise. 

June  13th.  (After  attending  a  revival  meet 
ing  where  she  heard  much  violent  talk.)  I  feel 
that  I  must  attack  this  creed  of  blood,  which  does 
much  to  keep  up  the  cruel  and  sanguinary  views 
of  barbarous  ages  about  God  and  man.  Will 
take  text,  "Flesh  and  blood  cannot  inherit  the 
kingdom  of  heaven."  Show  that  Christ  brought 
a  new  interest  into  the  world;  a  new  vision  of 
God,  the  loving  one;  a  new  view  of  man,  the 
hopeful  and  universal  one ;  his  death  in  its  char 
acter  the  seal  to  his  perfect  life.  But  we  are 
saved  by  his  doctrine,  by  the  same  spirit  which 
animated  his  life, — we  are  saved  by  his  life,  not 
by  his  death,  except  as  it  was  the  necessary  moral 
sequence  of  his  life. 

36 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

July  23rd.  Must  write  a  sermon;  "Chanty 
never  faileth."  This  will  probably  teach  me  as 
much  as  it  will  teach  any  one.  Have  read  from 
the  lovely  chapter  (I  Corinthians:  xiii)  which  had 
to  me  a  new  significance — the  limited  and  tran 
sient  character  of  human  knowledge :  "We  know 
in  part  and  we  prophesy  in  part."  Charity  is 
an  unending  self-discipline  which  always  looks 
and  leads  towards  the  eternal  affection.  There 
fore,  its  triumph  shall  be  lasting  and  everlasting. 

August  22nd.  "We  can  teach  no  virtues  we 
do  not  practice,"  occurred  to  me  this  afternoon ; 
for  without  learning  by  experience  how  a  virtue 
is  acquired,  how  can  we  teach  any  one  to  acquire 
it?  I  thought  of  this  in  connection  with  the  ex 
perience  of  undutiful  children.  By  the  working 
of  this  natural  cause,  they  will  not  make  their 
own  children  dutiful.  Read  in  Luke  of  the 
angel  which  appeared  to  Christ  in  Gethsemane, 
strengthening  Him.  We  all  see  this  angel  when 
we  say  truly,  "Thy  will,  not  mine,  be  done." 

August  23rd.  There  is  no  hell  like  that  of  a 
selfish  heart,  and  there  is  no  misfortune  so  great 
as  that  of  not  being  able  to  make  a  sacrifice. 
These  two  thoughts  come  to  me  strongly  this 
morning.  It  is  something  to  have  learned  these 
truths  so  that  we  can  never  again  doubt  them. 

September  I2th.  The  Spirit  seems  to  ask 
me  always,  "Shall  it  be  my  will  or  Thine?"  and 

37 


215168 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

I  say,  after  all  my  experience,  "Thy  will  is  best. 
Let  it  be  in  Thy  way." 

November  25th.  Thanksgiving  Day.  .  .  . 
Cannot  go  to  church,  but  will  thank  the  dear 
Father  for  the  good  that  He  brings  even  out  of 
our  evil.  Pray  earnestly  never  to  repeat  will 
fully  any  act  of  this  year  which  I  have  found  to 
be  an  error. 


1876 

Saturday,  January  8th.  (Her  husband  lying 
at  the  point  of  death.)  ...  I  pray  God  not  to 
leave  me  in  utter  despair,  but  to  send  me  the 
Comforter,  bestowed  in  humble  hope  and  sor 
rowing  resolutions.  Would  I  could  die  for  him ! 
Since  I  cannot,  let  me  live  so  as  to  honor  his 
sweet  and  sacred  memory. 

January  loth.  (After  her  husband's  death.) 
I  awoke  at  4 130  and  lay  still  to  bear  the  chasten 
ing  hand  of  God  laid  upon  me  in  severe  mercy. 
.  .  .  Some  good  words  came  to  me.  "Let  not 
your  heart  be  troubled,"  etc.  "He  doth  not  will 
ingly  afflict,"  etc. 

January  I4th.  Began  my  new  life  to-day. 
Prayed  God  that  it  might  have  a  greatly  added 
use  and  earnestness. 

February  8th.  (After  describing  a  memorial 
service  for  Dr.  Howe.)  There  was  a  cheerful 
tone  in  the  occasion  which  seems  to  me  as  I 
recall  it  truly  Christian.  The  victory  of  the 
spiritual  man  (conscience)  over  the  natural  man 
(self  and  sense)  seemed  to  unfold  to  us  the  vic 
tory  of  life  over  death.  I  saw  my  dear  com 
panion  .  .  .  crowned  with  the  best  glory  a  hu 
man  soul  can  have.  The  occasion  seemed  to 
make  it  so  clear  what  the  true  riches,  the  true 
honors  are.  Always  to  remember  it,  always  to 

39 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

work  the  better  for  it,  is  very  earnestly  my  prayer 
and  desire. 

February  Qth.  Yesterday  seems  to  have  filled 
the  measure  of  the  past.  To-day  I  must  run 
forward  in  the  pathways  of  the  future.  My 
dear  love  is  sometimes  with  me,  at  least  as  an 
energizing  and  inspiring  influence,  but  how  shall' 
I  deserve  ever  to  see  him  again  ? 

May  27th.  .  .  .  Why  is  it  that  we  can  only 
learn  of  suffering  by  suffering?  I  pray  God  to 
make  this  year,  if  given  to  me  at  all,  a  useful  one. 
.  .  .  Most  of  all,  I  think  God  has  taught  me 
something  of  the  real  values  of  life,  to  wit,  char 
acter,  intelligence,  and  true  friendship,  in  place 
of  the  false  idols  of  youth,  viz. :  passion,  pleasure, 
luxury  and  ambition. 

May  28th.  ...  I  made  it  my  prayer  that  I 
might  do  everything  required  of  me  and  fulfill 
all  my  own  undertakings,  but  do  nothing  with 
a  selfish  purpose  or  with  a  view  to  any  personal 
advantage. 

December  25th.  .  .  .  Service  at  Brooke  Her- 
ford's  church,  where  some  sweet  but  rather  pa 
thetic  music  made  me  shed  tears,  recalling  dear 
Chev,  who  was  alive  and  with  us  a  year  ago. 
...  I  cannot  be  fierce  against  my  human  in 
firmity,  and  the  dear  God,  who  shows  it  to  me 
more  and  more,  will,  I  trust,  enable  me  to  help 
40 


THE   WALK   WITH    GOD 

others  through  my  own  bitter  lessons,  but  let  all 
human  beings  pray  to  be  delivered  from  ingrati 
tude,  the  easiest  of  sins  and  perhaps  one  of  the 
most  dangerous. 


1878 

(The  journals  of  the  next  two  years  contain 
mostly  records  of  travel  in  Europe.) 

January  5th.  Rome.  To-day  begins  my  en 
try  of  things  noted  for  this  year,  with  the  prayer 
that  its  precious  days  may  have  a  good  and  use 
ful  record,  not  only  of  the  thoughts  and  studies 
which  I  love,  but  also  of  service  rendered  in  the 
manifold  ways  which  a  human  life  truly  in 
cludes.  The  want  of  retirement  and  consequent 
impossibility  of  concentrating  my  mind  upon 
anything  has  been  grievous  to  me,  so  far.  I  shall 
try  and  hope  to  do  better  hereafter. 

January  ijth. 
Sea,  sky,  and  snow-crowned  mountain,  one  fair 

world. 

Past,  Present,  Future,  one  eternity. 
Divine  and  human  and  informing  soul, 
The  mystic  trine,  thought  never  can  resolve. 


42 


1879 

February  1 5th.  Athens.  A  confused  day  in 
which  nothing  seems  to  go  right.  .  .  .  Felt  as 
if  God  could  not  have  made  so  bad  a  day, — my 
day,  after  all  (which)  I  made. 


43 


1880 
MEDITATION 

Why  should  we  thank  for  Day's  decline 
Who  saw  so  glad  the  morning  shine? 
If  Spring's  fair  promise  brings  us  joy, 
Doth  not  the  Winter  bliss  destroy? 
We  welcome  Life's  unfolding  breath, 
How  shall  we  sing  the  praise  of  Death? 

At  morn  we  go,  at  eve  we  wait 
To  learn  the  mystery  of  Fate. 
Must  vanish  all  that  doth  appear, 
Must  darken  all  that  shineth  clear, 
Must  perish  all  that  buds  and  grows, 
From  opening  day  to  opening  rose. 

For  "onward  ever"  is  the  word 
The  earliest  Creation  heard, 
Nature  shall  close  her  written  years 
With  the  same  sentence  in  her  ears, 
From  God  to  God  doth  onward  roll 
The  teeming  earth,  the  teeming  soul. 

January  i8th.  .  .  .  My  sixty  years  begin  to 
weigh  upon  me.  My  spirits  flag,  and  I  often  dread 
the  fatigue  of  meeting  with  many  people.  My 
natural  inertia  causes  me  to  delay  indefinitely 
some  pieces  of  work  that  I  feel  to  be  very  im 
portant  to  me,  such  as  the  writing  up  of  my 
notes  of  travel  and  the  settling  of  my  financial 

44 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

matters.  I  long  for  some  hours  of  complete 
isolation  every  day,  during  which  I  might  un 
fold  books,  papers,  etc.,  without  fear  of  inter 
ruption.  I  have  much  to  enjoy,  much  to  be 
thankful  for,  and  very  much  to  regret  in  my 
past  mistakes  and  failures  to  do  the  right  thing. 
God  help  me  to  resolve  and  do  my  best  with 
out  losing  all  power  in  the  discouraging  retro 
spect  of  so  much  that  has  been  honestly  erro 
neous  and  of  some  things  that  may  have  been 
willfully  wrong.  God  bless  and  help  also  my 
dear  children  and  children's  children.  With 
these  prayers  I  will  begin  my  new  record. 

Monday,  October  4th.  I  have  felt  to-day  a 
special  hope  and  impulse  in  the  direction  of  use 
ful  labor.  I  have  in  mind  at  present  two  ser 
mons,  one  on  Christ's  saying  about  building  the 
tombs  of  the  prophets,  of  which  the  lesson  would 
be  the  importance  of  learning  from  the  living 
teacher  and  honoring  him,  instead  of  merely  wor 
shiping  reputation,  whether  living  or  dead.  The 
second  would  be  upon  the  "Still,  small  voice," 
which  is  the  voice  of  God;  its  contrast  to  the 
violence  of  passion  and  the  fury  of  fanaticism. 
I  would  also,  if  I  could,  continue  my  subject  of 
warning  to  Americans,  as  conveyed  in  my  Con 
cord  and  Saratoga  lectures.  I  must  also  have  a 
paper  for  the  Women's  Congress. 


1882 

Sunday,  May  28th.  Whitsunday — the  be 
ginning  of  my  sixty-fourth  year.  God  grant  me 
this  year  to  do  only  what  is  worth  doing  and  to 
desire  only  what  is  worth  desiring. 

My  prayer  for  the  day  was  to  worship  God, 
our  Father  and  untiring  benefactor,  in  spirit  and 
in  truth. 

January  I4th,  I  have  tried  this  week  to  do 
the  things  I  ought  to  do  for  other  people.  .  .  . 

April  2^rd.  .  .  .  My  want  of  faith  in  my 
self  lessens  the  value  of  my  efforts.  I  have 
sometimes  felt  the  bounds  of  my  capacity  too  lit 
tle.  Perhaps  now  I  feel  them  too  much. 


46 


1884 

April  6th.  This  text  in  the  Scripture  lesson 
struck  me  as  good  for  a  sermon:  Jeremiah 
31:34 — "For  they  shall  all  know  me  from  the 
least  of  them  unto  the  greatest  of  them,  saith  the 
Lord."  Subject:  The  democracy  of  Christi 
anity.  I  felt  as  never  before  the  grandeur  and 
novelty  of  Christ's  having  shown  that  the  office 
of  the  Messiah  as  he  conceived  it,  was  to  lift  up 
the  lowly  and  reclaim  the  erring  and  apparently 
worthless.  Of  course,  I  have  heard  this  all  my 
life,  and  have  thought  of  it  a  good  deal.  What 
I  saw  to-day  was  the  startling  contrast  between 
this  view  and  the  general  ideas,  not  of  the  Jews 
only,  but  of  Christians  to-day. 

EASTER   MORNING   SERVICE 
April  ijth. 

Shall  I,  for  envy,  sell  the  deep  content 

Of  God's  dear  thought,  to  me  one  moment  lent  ? 

In  that  brief  moment  did  appear  to  me 
So  vast  the  riches  of  Heav'n's  treasury 

That  I  no  more  considered  that  poor  wealth 
Straining  for  which,  souls  lose  their  native  health. 

April  I3th.  I  felt  this  day  that,  in  my  diffi 
culties  with  the  anti-suffragists,  the  general 
spread  of  Christian  feeling  gives  me  ground  to 

47 


THE   WALK   WITH    GOD 

stand  upon.  The  chanty  of  Christendom  will 
not  persist  in  calumniating  the  suffragists,  nor 
will  its  sense  of  justice  long  refuse  to  admit  their 
claims. 

April  I4th.  I  woke,  heavy  with  uncertainties, 
and  with  much  thought  of  my  own  shortcomings, 
past  and  present.  I  may  say,  what  I  rarely  re 
cord,  that  an  earnest  prayer  helped  me  very  much, 
and  set  me  on  my  feet,  to  walk  and  work  another 
day. 

April  2Oth.  My  usual  worry  and  depression 
at  waking.  Thought  sadly  of  errors  and  short 
comings.  At  church,  a  penitential  psalm  helped 
me  much,  and  the  sermon  more.  I  felt  assured 
that,  whatever  may  be  my  fate  beyond  this  life, 
I  should  always  seek,  love,  and  rejoice  in  the 
good.  Thus,  even  in  hell,  one  might  share  by 
sympathy  the  heavenly  victory. 

June  ijth.  Black  with  depression.  Longing 
to  give  up  the  fight,  and  retire  as  a  veteran. 

July  6th.  In  such  peace  as  they  only  have 
who  have  been  forced  to  go  into  turmoil  for  the 
sake  of  necessary  results,  and  have  mercifully 
come  out  of  it. 

July  20th.  ...  I  thought  of  a  text  for  my 
next  sermon.     "The  spirit  of  the  Lord  is  upon 
me,  because  He  hath  appointed  me  to  preach  the 
gospel  to  the  poor." 
48 


THE   WALK   WITH    GOD 

Christ  twice  quotes  this,  the  second  time  in  his 
message  to  John  Baptist.  He  does  not  say,  "The 
rulers  and  magnates  follow  me,"  but  "to  the 
poor  the  gospel  is  preached."  A  good  point  for 
me  to  make. 

August  nth.  (After  preaching  the  sermon 
suggested  above.)  It  may  be  that  I  am  losing 
my  power  of  extempore  speech.  I  have  suffered 
great  distress  about  this  occasion,  though  I  do  not 
know  that  it  was  considered  a  failure.  I  know 
that  I  had  intended  to  strike  a  valorous  blov 
against  the  wealth-worship  of  the  time.  My 
text  was  from  Luke  4:  17:  "The  spirit  of  the 
Lord  is  upon  me  ...  to  preach  the  gospel  to 
the  poor."  I  had  studied  and  worked  at  my 
sermon  much  more  than  usual,  and  found  the 
subject  much  larger  than  it  had  appeared  to  me 
at  first.  Like  the  little  Christ  on  the  shoulders 
of  St.  Christopher,  it  seemed  to  weigh  me  down 
to  the  ground,  though  I  had  taken  it  up  lightly. 
Might  this  be  a  lesson  of  hope,  and  not  of  dis 
couragement  ! 

...  I  remember  that  sometimes  the  effort  is 
to  be  our  success.  It  shows  our  good  will — our 
power  may  not  correspond  to  it. 

August  25th.  In  my  morning  prayer,  which  is 
always  short,  and  made  standing,  I  asked  for 
three  things,  to  wit,  the  bitter  of  true  repent 
ance,  the  sharp  flavor  of  a  biting  and  spurring 
energy,  the  sweetness  of  believing  that  my  sins 

49 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

are  forgiven  and  that  I  have  tried  to  do  some 
thing  to  help  my  fellow  men. 

September  7th.  (After  preaching  the  same 
sermon,  under  better  conditions  of  health  and 
spirits.)  ...  I  enjoyed  the  service  myself,  and 
had  some  good  moments  of  freedom  in  my  ser 
mon,  quite  like  my  best  times.  ...  I  was  very 
thankful  for  this  good  coming  through,  and  en 
couraged  to  try  again  in  the  future. 

December  28th.  .  .  .  Thought  also  of  a 
new  application  of  Christ's  words:  "This  is  my 
body."  We  too  should  so  offer  our  bodily  life 
to  the  service  of  God  and  humanity  as  to  be  able 
to  say:  "This  which  I  offer  is  my  very  body,  my 
very  blood,  the  essence  and  quintessence  of  my 
daily  life,  which  I  lived  subject  to  the  laws  of 
use  and  service." 


1835 

January  gth.  I  pray  God  to-day  that  I  may 
be  able  to  give  that  attention  to  my  business  af 
fairs  which  is  necessary  for  the  security  of  those 
who  are  to  survive  me.  My  absent  habit  of 
mind  leads  me  to  mislay  important  letters  and 
papers,  and  to  many  sins  of  this  kind. 

September  6th.  Busy  in  the  morning  with 
preparing  my  sermon  on  the  Gospel  of  Hope,  in 
contradistinction  to  'the  old  terrible  doctrines. 
Danger  of  religious  indifference  and  of  want  of 
religious  training  for  our  children  on  the  present 
skeptical  basis. 


1886 

March  30th.  (After  the  death  of  her  daugh 
ter  Julia.)  Wrote  to :  "I  am  not  wild,  nor 

melancholy,  nor  inconsolable ;  but  I  feel,  as  Amer 
ica  might  if  some  great  fair  State  were  blotted 
from  the  map,  leaving  only  a  void  for  the  salt 
and  bitter  sea  to  overwhelm.  I  cannot  so  far 
get  any  comfort  from  other-worldly  imaginings." 

If  God  says  anything  to  me  now,  He  says 
"Thou  fool."  The  truth  is  that  we  have  no  no 
tion  of  the  value  and  beauty  of  God's  gifts  until 
they  are  taken  from  us.  Then  He  may  well  say, 
"Thou  fool,"  and  we  can  only  answer  to  our 
name, 

April  27th.  Have  had  an  uplifting  of  soul 
to-day.  I  am  at  last  getting  to  stand  where  I 
can  have  some  spiritual  outlook.  The  confusion 
of  "is  not,"  is  giving  place  to  the  steadfastness 
of  "is." 

May  30th.  ...  To  Church  of  the  Disciples, 
where  it  was  Memorial  Day  in  the  Sunday 
School.  Told  the  children  about  my  writing  of 
the  Battle  Hymn.  Told  them  that  the  true 
glory  of  God  which  I  saw  then  was  not  in  the 
pomp  and  circumstance  of  war,  not  in  military 
glory  and  victory,  but  in  the  rising  up  of  the 
nation  to  stand  up  for  the  right  and  to  die  for  it 
if  need  be.  I  told  them  that  whenever  they 
would  stand  up  for  the  right  in  any  struggle, 
contest  or  trial,  they  would  see  this  glory. 


1887 

April  nth.  To  Providence;  invited  to  attend 
supper  of  Unitarian  Club  and  make  an  address. 
The  keynote  to  this  was  given  me  yesterday  by 
the  sight  of  the  people  who  thronged  the  popu 
lar  churches,  attracted,  in  a  great  measure  no 
doubt,  by  the  Easter  decorations  and  music.  I 
thought:  "What  a  pity  that  everybody  cannot 
hear  Phillips  Brooks."  I  also  thought:  "They 
can  all  hear  the  lesson  of  heavenly  truth  in  the 
great  Church  of  All  Souls  and  of  All  Saints; 
there  is  room  enough  and  to  spare." 


1888 

January  ist.  My  first  act  this  year  was  to 
preach  before  the  Parker  Fraternity.  My  text 
was  Christ's  saying  to  Peter:  "Upon  this  rock  1 
will  build  my  church."  The  text  came  to  me 
almost  as  soon  as  I  received  the  invitation  and  1 
wrote  the  sermon  under  great  difficulties  of  in 
terruption,  removal  to  Boston,  et  cetera.  My 
theme  was  the  religious  element  in  human  na 
ture,  and  its  normal  manifestations  in  worship, 
sacrifice  and  revelation,  or  the  vision  of  divine 
things.  It  seemed  to  interest  those  present  a 
good  deal,  as  it  did  me. 

January  20th.  I  have  no  superstition  about 
opening  on  passages  of  the  Bible,  yet  will  record 
that  as  I  opened  our  service  book  for  reading  this 
morning,  my  eye  rested  on  the  following  pas 
sage:  "I  have  blotted  out  as  a  thick  cloud  thy 
transgressions,  and  as  a  cloud  thy  sins;  return 
unto  me  for  I  have  redeemed  thee." 

Sunday,  March  i8th.  Thought  I  ought  to 
stay  at  home  and  work.  Struck  a  good  vein  and 
scratched  awhile,  then  rushed  for  my  dear 
church  where  I  heard  a  good  deal  of  the  good 
minister's  *  prayer  and  a  sermon  from  him  which 

*  The  Revd.  Charles  Gordon  Ames,  who  had  re 
cently  succeeded  Mr.  Clarke  as  pastor  of  the  Church 
of  the  Disciples. 

54 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

I  can  only  call  surpassing  in  its  beauty  and 
pathos.  "As  we  forgive  those  who  trespass 
against  us"  was  the  text,  and  never  did  divine 
words  receive  a  more  divine  interpretation.  It 
will  surely  be  published,  and  my  head  is  too 
tired  to  repeat  any  of  it  here.  Suffice  it  to  say 
that  it  moved  me  to  real  heart-tears  of  joy  and 
comfort.  The  hymn  was  "Nearer,  My  God,  to 
Thee."  I  should  like  to  write  a  poem  about  it. 
A  woman  composed  it,  and  I  heard  it  again  and 
again  at  Theodore  Parker's.  Heard  it  most  at 
my  sweet  Julia's  funeral.  Felt  it  much  to-day. 

Sunday,  September  23rd.  To  church  in  town. 
A  suggestive  sermon  from  Mr.  Alger  on 
"Watching,"  i.e.,  upon  all  the  agencies  that 
watch  us:  children ;  foes ;  friends;  critics;  authori 
ties;  spirits;  God  Himself. 

As  we  drove  into  town  I  had  one  of  those 
momentary  glimpses  which  in  things  spiritual  are 
so  infinitely  precious.  The  idea  became  clear 
and  present  to  my  mind  that  God,  an  actual  pres 
ence,  takes  note  of  our  actions  and  intentions.  I 
thought  how  helpful  it  would  be  to  us  to  pass 
our  lives  in  a  sense  of  this  divine  supervision. 
After  this  inward  experience  I  was  almost 
startled  by  the  theme  of  Alger's  sermon.  I 
spoke  to  him  of  the  coincidence  and  he  said  it 
must  have  been  a  thought  wave.  The  thought 
is  one  to  which  I  have  need  to  cling.  I  have  at 
this  moment  mental  troubles,  obsessions  of  imag 
ination,  from  which  I  pray  to  be  delivered. 

55 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

While  this  idea  of  the  divine  presence  was  clear 
to  me,  I  felt  myself  lifted  above  these  things. 
May  this  lifting  continue. 

Friday,  September  28th.  In  my  prayer  this 
morning  I  had  again  a  glimpse  of  the  transcend 
ent  things.  The  presence  of  God  appeared  to 
me  on  Sunday  last  as  a  constant  point  of  rever 
ence  and  judgment  for  conduct;  to-day  it  ap 
peared  to  me  as  a  perpetual  nearness  of  help 
and  loving  comfort. 

Extracts  from  my  prayer  at  the  Tiverton  Serv 
ice,  September  gth,  1888: 

"Thou  who  art  to  us  the  supreme  of  comfort 
and  consolation,  the  supreme  also  of  judgment 
and  correction. 

"We  pray  to  thee  as  individual  souls,  to  each' 
one  of  which  thou  hast  given  an  immortal  prom 
ise  and  an  immortal  destiny — as  members  of 
families,  surrounded  by  dear  ones  whose  welfare 
is  as  precious  to  us  as  our  own — as  citizens  of  a 
country  to  which  thou  hast  given  a  leadership  of 
the  nations  of  the  earth."  I  forget  what  I  asked 
for  us  as  individuals — as  members  of  families  I 
asked  that  the  bond  of  love  might  rule  in  our 
households,  and  that  with  children  and  servants 
we  might  remember  that  God  is  father  of  all  and 
master  of  all.  For  our  dear  Country  in  this 
time  of  excitement  and  doubt,  I  asked  that  she 
might  remember  that,  whoever  may  govern,  God 
is  really  governor  of  all. 

I  have  written  this  down  because  I  thought  it 

56 


THE    WALK   WITH    GOD 

better  than  my  usual  prayers.  I  write  it  from 
very  imperfect  remembrance. 

Text  of  a  screed  unused: 

Oh !  you  dear  young  people,  upon  whose  faith 
fulness  depends  the  fate  of  further  generations, 
do  not  waste  precious  years  in  the  mistakes  of 
selfishness ! 

Now  that  the  generous  impulses  of  Youth  and 
the  discipline  of  good  teaching  are  fresh  and 
strong  in  you,  address  yourselves  to  discern  the 
most  imperative  needs  of  Humanity.  So  shall 
you  learn  to  meet  them  with  good  service.  So 
shall  future  generations  rise  up  rightly  to  call 
you  blessed. 

Sunday,  November  4th.  In  my  prayer  this 
morning  I  thanked  God  that  I  have  come  to 
grieve  more  over  my  moral  disappointments  than 
over  my  intellectual  ones.  With  my  natural 
talents  I  had  nothing  to  do;  with  my  use  or 
abuse  of  them,  everything. 

I  have  thought  too,  lately,  of  a  reason  why  we 
should  not  neglect  our  duty  for  others  for  our 
real  or  supposed  duty  to  ourselves.  It  is  this: 
ourselves  we  have  always  with  us;  our  fellows 
flit  from  our  company,  or  pass  away;  and  we 
must  help  them  when  and  while  we  can. 

Monday,  November  5th.  My  last  day  here 
this  season.  I  go,  thanking  God  for  the  lovely 
summer  of  work  and  rest,  family  affection  and 
social  enjoyment.  It  is  all  delightful  to  look 

57 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

back  upon,  and  another  such  season  is  lovely  to 
look  forward  to,  though  my  age  more  than  any 
thing  else  makes  this  doubtful.  However  it  may 
chance,  I  feel  as  if  I  should  be  reconciled,  trust 
ing  in  the  infinite  goodness  and  wisdom. 

December  30th.  *  *  *  The  ideal  Christ  is 
justified  by  the  love  and  worship  of  humanity. 
With  our  imperfect  knowledge  of  facts  con 
cerning  him  and  our  equally  imperfect  capacity 
of  interpreting  them,  it  is  better  as  well  as  hap 
pier  to  hold  on  to  this  vision  of  the  divine  man, 
than  to  dogmatize  either  way  about  his  nature. 


1889 

January  1st.  In  my  prayer  this  night  I  asked 
for  weight  and  earnestness  of  purpose.  I  am  too 
frivolous  and  frisky. 

January  2Qth.  My  word  for  the  Danvers 
Suffrage  meeting  was  Christ's  two  sayings  about 
his  bringing  a  sword  and  also  giving  peace.  The 
sword  was  the  weapon  of  discriminating  thought, 
bringing  in  a  better  interpretation  of  the  old 
faith  and  doctrine.  The  peace  was  what  would 
follow  the  adoption  of  the  better  doctrine.  Suf 
frage  divides  society  now  and  calls  for  a  new 
study  in  the  doctrines  of  freedom  and  justice. 
Peace  will  come  when  this  study  shall  have  been 
made  and  its  results  practically  applied. 

February  24-th.  In  the  evening  heard  Verdi's 
beautiful  Requiem.  Was  struck  with  the  ex 
pression  it  gave  to  the  terrorism  of  the  old  the 
ology;  the  vengeance  of  offended  majesty  on  the 
one  hand,  the  piteous  pleading  of  frightened  souls 
on  the  other.  As  a  work  of  human  imagination, 
this  old  scheme  of  judgment,  damnation  and  sal 
vation  was  sublime;  as  a  revelation  of  a  Being 
superhuman  in  goodness  and  wisdom,  it  is  sim 
ply  absurd. 

June  ist.  I  have  said  to  God  on  every  morn 
ing  of  these  busy  days:  "Give  me  this  day,"  and 
He  has  given  them  all;  i.e.,  He  has  given  me 
power  to  fulfill  the  task  appointed  for  each. 

59 


THE   WALK   WITH    GOD 

June  9th.  I  find,  more  and  more,  that  the 
thought  which  came  to  me  at  the  Worcester  read- 
'ing  helps  me  to  a  new  view  of  life  in  which  the 
soul  perpetually  gives  up  to  God  and  receives 
from  Him.  What  we  give  up  in  this  way  we 
receive  in  another,  with  a  happy  sanction  and 
confidence. 

July  i5th.  I  take  for  my  guidance  a  new 
motto:  "I  will  ascend,"  not  in  my  ambition  but 
in  my  thoughts  and  aims. 

July  2 1 st.  A  dry  Sunday,  i.e.,  no  church,  it 
being  the  women's  turn  to  go.  ...  I  think  of 
two  sermons  to  write,  one  "A  spirit  of  Power" ; 
one,  "Behold,  I  show  you  a  more  excellent  way." 

August  Qth.  I  think  to-day  of  a  good  theme 
for  a  sermon:  "The  Glory  that  shall  be  re 
vealed."  Am  not  quite  sure  whether  this  is  a 
scripture  text,  but  could  find  one  which  would 
take  its  place.  Query:  What  will  be  the  glory 
of  the  future  revelation?  It  is  a  truth  and  a 
glory  now,  only  we  do  not  see  it.  The  eternal 
principles  of  the  moral  law,  the  progress  of  the 
divine  order.  These  eternal  verities  are  always 
present  in  the  world  and  are  partially  known  to 
elect  spirits  here  and  there;  but  when  "all  flesh 
shall  see  it,"  then  these  great  truths  will  be  made 
known  to  all  and  will  become  embodied  in  hu- 
jnan  life  and  government. 
60 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

August  1 4th.  My  inward  prayer  is  still, 
"Take  and  give!  Take  away  my  foolish  life  and 
give  me  my  life  back  again,  informed  by  Thy 
wisdom." 

September  8th.  To-day  for  the  second  time  I 
seemed  to  have  met  Mr.  Alger's  sermon  as  I 
drove  in  to  attend  church.  The  discourse  was 
very  metaphysical  and  long  winded,  but  the  di 
rect  and  important  train  of  thought  was  much 
like  that  which  seized  me  as  I  sat  in  my  car 
riage.  I  thought  of  the  different  ways  of  serv 
ing  Duty;  first,  as  Christ  did,  in  loneliness  and 
hardship.  I  thought  of  him  as  one  standing  on 
a  lonely  beach  waiting  to  find,  as  he  did,  the  pearl 
of  a  perfect  doctrine  with  which  to  redeem  the 
world ;  then  of  a  fire  ship  with  its  devoted  crew ; 
then  of  a  pleasant  party  of  saintly  people.  This, 
it  seemed  to  me,  would  be  my  best  chance.  Alger 
named  several  gates  of  Heaven,  innocence,  vic 
tory,  penitence,  resignation,  retribution.  This 
was  the  best  part  of  the  sermon  because  the  most 
tangible.  Tried  to  write  this  out  in  verse,  some 
of  which  occurred  to  me  as  I  drove  into  town; 
succeeded  poorly. 

October  20th.  We  do  not  ask  that  Thy  truth 
may  conquer,  because  it  cannot  but  conquer;  its 
conquest  is  assured  from  the  very  foundation  of 
the  world.  But  we  do  ask  that  we  may  have  a 
part  in  this  great  victory,  the  part  of  humble, 
faithful  followers  who  have  seen  Thy  banner  un- 

6l 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

rolled  in  its  glory,  which  is  above  all  other  glories, 
above  all  the  splendors  of  the  visible  universe, 
above  sunrise  and  sunset. 

May  every  one  of  us  be  enrolled  in  the  Church 
of  All  Saints  and  All  Souls,  which  has  been  or 
dained,  instituted  and  inspired  by  Thee,  from  and 
for  all  time.  Amen. 

Spoke  to  the  text,  "God  hath  not  left  Him 
self  without  a  witness."  This  witness  is  in  all 
human  hearts,  which,  with  all  its  intense  de 
sires,  desires  most  of  all  law,  order,  religion. 

October  2 1st.  The  afternoon  service  yester 
day  was  a  vesper  with  much  music,  really  sweet 
and  soothing.  I  applied  my  text  to  the  coming 
out  into  the  new  territories;  a  rough  Exodus 
stimulated  by  the  love  of  gold,  but  with  the  army 
of  fortune  seekers  go  faithful  souls,  and  instead 
of  passing  out  of  civilization,  they  extend  its 
bounds.  "Praise  waiteth  for  thee  in  Zion" — 
yes,  but  the  Prophet  says:  "The  solitary  places 
shall  be  made  glad  for  them,"  et  cetera.  I  set 
this  down  for  future  use. 

Good  Mr.  Van  Ness  called  just  now  and 
thanked  me  warmly  for  my  sermon  of  yesterday 
morning.  My  statement  of  the  way  in  which 
religion  does  bind,  seems  to  have  impressed  him. 
I  ask  God  to  give  me  grace  and  comfort  in  what 
I  have  now  undertaken. 

I  spoke  also  of  religious  faith  as  belief  not  in 
especial  dogmas  but  in  the  power  of  God's  truth 
and  in  man's  power  to  receive  it. 
62 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

November  24th.  Preached  for  Dr.  Stebbins 
my  "Eleventh  Hour"  sermon.  The  organist  in 
troduced  my  Battle  Hymn  into  his  voluntary.  I 
sought  much  in  mind  for  my  prayer,  but  found 
two  leading  thoughts  for  it,  the  best  being: 
God's  knowledge  not  only  of  the  evil  in  us  but 
of  our  good  capacities;  also  His  power  of  uplift 
ing  us  to  the  ideal  humanity  for  which  He  created 
us.  "The  seed  of  faith  which  Thou  hast  put 
in  our  heart  through  all  generations,  may  it  mul 
tiply  and  grow  and  prevail  with  might." 

"Not  one  glorious  feature  is  lost  to  Thee,  of 
those  with  which  Thou  didst  make  man  in  Thine 
own  image." 

My  sermon  and  prayer  told,  I  was  assured, 
and  indeed  I  felt  it  at  the  time.  Deo  grat'ws. 


December  22nd.  (In  California.)  A  lovely 
day  with  dear  Sister  Annie  and  Loullie.  A. 
would  have  a  little  Sunday  service.  I  read  part 
of  the  twenty-third  chapter  of  Matthew  and 
spoke  first  of  the  Bible  in  my  hands;  the  same 
which  dear  father  formerly  used  at  family  devo 
tions.  "This  book  preaches,"  I  said,  and  then 
took  the  passage  about  the  altar  sanctifying  the 
gift,  and  the  temple  the  vow,  taking  Christ's  in 
tention  in  this  to  have  been  to  lead  his  hearers  in 
ward  from  the  symbolic  right  to  the  depth  of  the 
religious  thought.  Spoke  of  sincerity  in  religion 
as  attainable  only  by  effort;  getting  away  from 
the  stereotyped  phrases  and  attitudes  to  the  in- 

63 


THE   WALK    WITH    GOD 

wardness  of  religious  life.  Spoke  of  God  as  the 
great  light  at  which  we  may  rekindle  our  little 
candles  blown  out  by  the  strong  currents  of  our 
earthly  life. 


ALL  SOULS 

I  pace  along  my  lonely  way, 
Sedate,  who  once  was  wildly  gay, 
Ferocious  in  my  sadness  too, 
As  one  whose  pleasure  Fate  should  do, 

The  lessons  of  these  many  years 
Resounding  in  unwilling  ears. 
My  saints  were  visions  in  the  clouds, 
With  haloes  that  no  shadow  shrouds. 

But  I  walk  painfully  and  slow, 
With  many  another  child  of  woe, 
And  pass  Thy  palace  gate  before, 
For  judgment  open  evermore. 

Here  perfect  truth  shall  guide  the  hand 
By  which  the  balance  fine  is  spanned ; 
And  here  is  known  the  deep  intent 
Of  Love  that  never  may  repent. 

Oh !  at  that  broad  ancestral  hearth, 
Renew  the  promise  of  our  birth ! 
For  goals  that  we  have  failed  to  reach, 
For  lessons  that  we  could  not  teach, 

Give  us  the  hope  that  never  dies. 
Let  its  calm  sentence  make  us  wise, 
Redeemed  from  sorrow,  freed  from  sin, 
Let  us,  the  erring,  enter  in! 

65 


1890 

March  2nd.  Preached  at  Church  of  the  Dis 
ciples.  ...  I  had  to  think  a  good  deal  over  my 
prayer,  but  found  at  last  a  leading  thought  in 
God's  redeeming  power  by  which  "what  we 
begin  in  weakness  Thou  dost  establish  in  strength, 
and  even  what  we  begin  with  an  ill  and  evil  in 
tention,  Thou  art  able  to  convert  into  good." 
My  first  words  were  like  the  following:  "O 
Lord,  our  Creator,  preserver  and  constant  bene 
factor,  we  know  that  Thou  art  in  all  our  life ;  the 
most  careless  of  us  will  call  upon  Thee  in  any 
great  danger,  or  before  any  great  undertaking, 
but  the  nearer  things  hide  Thee  from  us,  although 
we  need  Thee  every  hour  and  always.  Grant 
that  we  may  seek  Thee  with  sincere  and  devoted 
hearts." 

I  gave  thanks  for  the  great  institutions  of 
public  worship,  for  the  fellowship  of  years 
which  had  made  it  good  for  us  to  meet  together, 
for  the  holy  and  happy  leadership  which  we  so 
long  enjoyed  and  for  the  renewed  guidance  now 
given  to  us,  etc.,  etc. 

March  i6th.  That  I  may  serve  God  without 
reserve,  is  my  prayerful  wish  to-day.  In  consult 
ing  my  own  convenience  and  desired  harmony 
with  my  surroundings,  I  have  so  often  said, 
"Thus  far  and  no  farther";  I  now  say,  "As  far 
as  Thou  wilt,  for  only  Thy  wisdom  shall  surely 
66 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

be  under  my  feet,  the  foundation  of  what  I  may 
attempt." 

May  2 1 st.  In  the  morning,  before  I  was  well 
awake,  this  thought  came  to  me :  the  sibyl's  awful 
hand  writes  the  scattered  events  of  daily  life  into 
history,  and  in  so  doing,  not  only  records  but 
helps  to  shape  the  fate  of  humanity.  Tried  to 
say  something  of  this  in  my  speech. 

May  2Qth.  (After  attending  a  meeting  of 
the  Universalist  Women's  Missionary  Society.) 
Thank  God  for  the  word  which  I  found  to 
day;  the  hospitality  of  Christendom  through 
which  I  was  invited,  the  fitness  of  liberal  Chris 
tianity  for  the  (so-called)  heathen  nations  to 
whom  the  old  theological  casuistries  are  in 
comprehensible  ;  "the  world  our  field" ;  the  phil 
osophy  of  missions  is  this:  we  have  need  of  this 
great  extension  of  religious  effort  and  sympathy; 
the  hopeful  element  in  women;  its  power  in 
fitting  them  for  mission  work. 

Thursday,  June  I2th.  Oak  Glen.  Dear  Mas 
ter,  may  this  season  be  a  good  one  between  Thee 
and  me!  May  I  be  diligent,  sincere,  reason 
able  and  charitable,  and  may  I  do  what  is  to  be 
done  for  others  with  a  cheerful  and  ready  heart. 

Sunday,  August  lOth.  I  have  been  thinking 
both  before  and  after  the  sermon  of  the  moral 
near-sightedness  which  we  acquire  by  living  in 

67 


THE   WALK   WITH    GOD 

only  what  immediately  surrounds  and  con 
cerns  us.  "Lift,  oh,  lift  thine  eyes,"  is  a  text 
from  which  I  should  like  to  preach  a  sermon. 


August  24th.  (After  speaking  to  the  inmates 
of  the  Reform  Prison  for  Women  at  South  Fra- 
mingham)  Woke  up  feeling  quite  well  and 
refreshed.  Thought  I  would  fall  back  upon  the 
text  which  I  had  first  thought  of  in  connection 
with  this  occasion,  a  text  of  cheer  and  uplifting: 
"Thine  is  the  kingdom,  and  the  power,  and  the 
glory."  Read  part  of  Isaiah,  4Oth.  Said  that  I 
had  wished  to  bring  them  some  words  of  com 
fort  and  exhilaration.  Pointed  out  how  the  Lord's 
Prayer  begins  with  solemn  worship  and  ascrip 
tion,  aspiring  to  God's  Kingdom,  praying  for 
daily  bread  and  for  deliverance  from  tempta 
tion  and  all  evil;  at  the  close  it  rises  into  this 
joyous  strain,  "Thine  is  the  kingdom,"  et  cetera. 
Tried  to  show  how  the  kingdom  is  God,  the  great 
providential  order,  before  and  beyond  all  earthly 
government ;  then  the  power,  that  of  perfect  wis 
dom  and  goodness,  the  power  to  know  and  rule 
all  things,  to  be  everywhere  and  ever  present,  to 
regulate  the  mighty  sweep  of  stars  and  planets, 
and,  at  the  same  time,  to  take  note  of  the  poorest 
and  smallest  of  us;  the  glory  first  of  the  visible 
universe,  glory  of  the  day  and  night,  of  the 
seasons,  glory  of  the  redeeming  power  of  truth, 
glory  of  inexhaustible  patience,  of  boundless  com 
passion  and  love. 
68 


THE   WALK   WITH    GOD 

September  3rd.  Prayed  in  the  morning  for 
such  a  view  of  human  nature  as  belongs  to  real 
charity.  Somehow,  throughout  the  day,  a  more 
charitable  paraphrase  of  everybody's  conduct 
seemed  to  present  itself  to  me,  as  if  my  prayer 
had  really  found  an  answer. 

December  8th.  Some  people  are  favored  with 
Paul's  vision.  I  have  had  Peter's:  "What  God 
hath  cleansed,  that  call  not  thou  common." 


69 


RETROSPECTS 

Little  wicked  I 

Once  the  Almighty's  power  did  deny: 
"Thou  art  from  everlasting,  that  is  longer, 
But  I  am  of  to-day,  and  Youth  is  stronger. 
Thine  are  the  viewless  depths  of  Night  and  Day ; 
This  corner's  mine,  and  I  will  have  my  way." 

Little  foolish  I 

Once  on  my  own  fool-wisdom  would  rely: 
"The  prayers  and  prophecies  are  grand,  no  doubt, 
But  I  this  problem  have  well  reasoned  out; 
I  apprehend  Creation  at  a  glance, 
And  take  my  time  to  flit  and  flirt,  and  dance." 

Little  puzzled  I 

Review  my  fooleries,  and  ask  God  why? 
Why  these  sad,  silly  antics  didst  permit? 
Why  did  I  waste  my  seasons  and  my  wit? 
"To  Me  thy  young  rebellious  heart  did  say: 
'This  corner's  mine,  and  I  will  have  my  way  T  " 


70 


1891 

Saturday,  January  Jist.  Oh,  that  we  could 
realize  in  busy  life,  how  fleeting  are  our  oppor 
tunities  of  showing  good  will  and  affection  to 
individuals. 

Saturday,  April  7th.  .  .  .  The  Communion 
which  followed  was  to  me  almost  miraculous. 
Mr.  Ames  called  it  a  festival  of  commemoration, 
and  it  brought  me  a  mind  vision  of  the  many  de 
parted  dear  ones.  One  after  another  the  dear 
forms  seemed  to  paint  themselves  on  my  inner 
vision;  first,  the  nearer  in  point  of  time;  last, 
my  Brother  Henry  and  Samuel  Eliot.  I  felt  that 
this  experience  ought  to  pledge  me  to  new  and 
more  active  effort  to  help  others.  In  my  mind 
I  said,  "The  obstacle  to  this  is  my  natural  inertia, 
my  indolence";  then  came  the  thought,  God  can 
overcome  this  indolence  and  give  me  increased 
power  of  service  and  zeal  for  it.  Those  present, 
I  think,  all  considered  the  sermon  and  Com 
munion  as  of  special  power  and  interest.  It  al 
most  made  me  fear  lest  it  should  prove  a  Swan 
Song  from  the  dear  minister.  Perhaps  it  is  I, 
not  he,  who  may  soon  depart. 

Tuesday,  July  2ist.  I  have  read  daily  for 
some  time  past,  a  psalm  of  David  and  a 
chapter  of  Proverbs.  The  religion  of  the  one, 
and  the  practical  wisdom  of  the  other,  are  pos 
sessions  too  much  neglected  nowadays. 

71 


THE   WALK   WITH    GOD 

Monday,  July  2?th.  "Death  is  swallowed 
up  in  victory";  for  those  of  us  who  love 
the  good,  seeing  its  victories  which  every  one 
who  lives  and  thinks  may  see,  will  or  should  pass 
from  earthly  life  in  peace  and  contentment.  The 
sense  of  his  own  death  will  be  swallowed  up  in 
God's  eternal  victory,  which  the  divine  part  of 
him  must  share. 

Saturday,  October  loth.  I  am  learning 
by  experience  that  a  pound  of  feathers  is  as  heavy 
as  a  pound  of  lead,  and  much  harder  to  handle. 

Friday,  December  25th.  I  saw  Love  as 
the  great  solvent  of  the  world  problem;  saw 
how  God  could  take  care  of  the  stars  and  of  the 
sparrows;  infinite  love  would  have  this  infinite 
power. 


AFTER  THE  WOMEN'S  RALLY 

September 


The  blessed  web  that  angels  weave 
Of  love  to  God  and  love  to  man, 

Let  me  therein  some  pattern  leave 
Ere  rounds  my  life  its  little  span. 

The  holy  church  that  heroes  build 

With  lofty  thought  and  purpose  sound, 

Ere  Time's  last  rays  my  sunset  gild, 
There  let  some  stone  of  mine  be  found. 

The  psalm  where  prayer  and  music  meet, 
In  joy-floods,  rolling  from  on  high, 

To  such  a  rhythm,  grand  and  sweet, 
May  my  departing  footsteps  fly! 


73 


TRINITY  CHURCH,  BOSTON 

Christmas,  1891 

I  have  tasted  my  Communion  in  a  golden  cup 

of  joy, 
Tho'  I  held  it  but  a  moment  nought  its  comfort 

could  destroy. 
All  the  bitterness  of  living,  all  life's  error,  all 

its  sin, 
Was  sublimed  to  rapturous  sweetness,  when  it 

passed  my  cup  within. 

To  the  Altar  came  a  vision  of  the  secret  of  the 

world, 
Of  the  leaders  God-inspired,  of  the  starry  flags 

unfurled, 
Crowned  Saints  and  armed  sinners,  walking  in 

opposing  ways, 
Till  the  discords  of  the  Ages  met  in  mingled 

hymns  of  praise. 

Oh !  how  can  He  who  rules  the  stars,  whose  will 
is  perfect  law, 

Take  note  of  us  who  idols  make  of  stubble  and 
of  straw? 

The  heart  of  Christ  and  Moses,  and  this  grovel 
ing  heart  of  mine, 

How  can  the  mighty  Alchemist  for  good  and 
truth  combine? 

74 


THE   WALK   WITH    GOD 

"God  save  the  king!"  and  yet  the  king  to  some 

false  god  doth  bow, 
To  pleasure,  wealth,  or  fashion,  lights  the  rank 

that  crowns  his  brow; 
And  on  the  throne  or  in  the  hut,  or  on  the  tented 

field, 
Where  God  might  look  for  seconding,  despite  is 

all  the  yield. 

The  lamps  were  in  bright  circle  hung,  the  waves 

of  melody 

In  cadences  majestical  around  them  seemed  to  fly. 
The  lamps  were  like  the  light  of  thought,  that 

shows  the  dark  without, 
But  the  hymn  was  like  the  bond  of  love  that 

binds  it  all  about. 

My  doubting  heart  no  longer  weighed  the  mis 
chiefs  of  its  past, 

No  longer  in  its  struggle  cried:  "Oh,  help  me, 
God,  at  last!"^ 

But  thus  it  spake :  "The  solvent  for  all  evil  things 
is  found, 

And  where  offence  of  man  abounds,  God's  grace 
doth  more  abound." 


1892 

Sunday,  January  3rd.  The  King's  palace 
is  all  lit  up  in  glory;  we  would  enter  in  and 
share  its  inner  light.  What  shall  we  bring  to 
our  Father?  Overflowing  gratitude.  What 
shall  we  ask  of  Him  ?  His  most  precious  spiritual 
gifts,  above  all  others,  steadfastness  in  our  pursuit 
of  good,  that  we  may  not  merely  flame  out  into 
brief  enthusiasm  which  shall  soon  appear  as  a 
"tale  that  is  told,"  but  may  follow  our  best 
inspirations  to  fruitful  ends. 

January  5th.  I  have  promised  the  dear  Lord 
to-day  that  if  I  may  only  live  out  this  winter,  I 
will  do  my  best  to  set  my  house  in  order  for  those 
who  will  stand  in  my  place.  .  .  . 

Tuesday,  February  23rd.  ...  I  suggested 
"the  nearest  duty  and  the  furthest  hope." 
...  I  reflected  that  many  of  us,  myself  often 
included,  try  on  the  contrary  for  the  farthest 
off  duty  and  the  most  immediate  hope. 

Saturday,  February  27th.  We  have  in 
society,  eminent  individuals,  decent  public  opin 
ion,  and  great  masses  of  ignorance  and  unprin- 
ciple.  Now  these  eminent  individuals,  and  the 
constantly  improving  public  opinion,  have  to  deal 
with  the  ignorant  many,  working  unceasingly  for 
their  enlightenment. 


76 


A  MOMENT'S  MEDITATION  IN 
COLOGNE  CATHEDRAL 

Enter  Life's  high  cathedral 
With  reverential  heart, 

Its  lofty  oppositions 

Matched  with  divinest  art. 

Thought  with  its  other  climbing 
To  meet  and  blend  on  high ; 

Man's  mortal  and  immortal 
Wed  for  eternity. 

When  noon's  high  mass  is  over, 
Muse  in  the  silent  aisles  ; 

Wait  for  the  coming  vespers 
In  which  new  promise  smiles. 

When  from  the  dome  height  echoes 

An  "lie,  missa  est" 
Whisper  thy  last  thanksgiving, 

Depart,  and  take  thy  rest. 


77 


THE   WALK   WITH    GOD 

April  1 5th.  ...  Had  a  time  of  discourage 
ment  and  prostration  at  waking.  Felt  the  de 
mands  made  upon  me  to  be  utterly  beyond  my 
strength  and  executive  power.  Prayed  for  a  lit 
tle  relief  from  this  fatigue  and  depression.  Got 
a  little  glimpse  of  a  thought  new  to  me,  viz.: 
that  Analysis  has  been  the  great  business  of  the 
age  I  have  lived  in.  Theodore  Parker  began  an 
analysis  of  religious  ideas  in  his  famous  first 
discourse.  Garrison,  Phillips  and  the  other  early 
abolitionists  were  analysts  of  the  political  con 
dition  of  the  country,  from  an  ethical  standpoint. 
The  suffragists  belong  to  the  same  class.  The 
real  humanists,  as  exemplified  in  college  settle 
ments,  the  promoters  of  neighborhood  guilds, 
etc.,  are  analysts  of  social  economy  from  the  same 
point  of  view.  The  white  light  of  Christ's  soul 
illuminates  all  this.  It  is  the  incandescent  elec 
tric  (light?). 


AT  MILWAUKEE 

The  tulips  on  the  border  of  the  lake 

A  missal-like  illumination  make, 

The  waters  spreading  like  a  silver  page, 

Where  the  sun  prints  his  text,  from  Age  to  Age, 

Which  the  lake's  heaving  bosom  doth  efface, 
Yet  is  its  teaching  steadfast  with  our  race, 
Message  of  splendor,  never  twice  the  same, 
Sealing  Creation's  story  with  God's  name. 

As  the  rose  leaves  around  the  rose's  heart, 
The  saints   of   God   may   gather   round    His 
throne ; 

But  alien  spirits,  in  far  realms  apart 
The  fellowship  of  Zion  have  not  known. 

Musing,  I  thought  upon  the  holy  band 
Who  ne'er  the  blessed  sphere  had  passed  out 
side: 

Fondly  to  them  I  stretched  the  pleading  hand, 
To  join  their  glorious  ranks  one  moment  cried. 

But  then  from  earth's  dark  corner  I  perceived 
The  coming  of  a  mighty  multitude, 

For  whom  the  Light  supreme  its  course  achieved, 
Redeeming  from  the  wild,  accursed  mood. 

To  these  I  prayed,  "Oh!  let  me  bring  the  news 
Of  what  in  nearer  vision  I  have  seen ; 

To  serve   their   greater  need  my  heart   would 

choose 
Above  the  heavenly  city's  sights  serene. 

7Q 


THE   WALK   WITH    GOD 

"For  to  their  painful  progress  should  belong 

My  lessons  of  infirmity  and  sin, 
And  how  world-problems  of  deceit  and  wrong 

Are  solved  by  some  who  late  may  enter  in, 

"As  left  the  Christ  the  sentence  dear  and  deep 
Of  Love's  great  victory  which  all  shall  crown ; 

The  heavenly  Shepherd  seeking  other  sheep 
To  be  redeemed  and  folded  as  his  own." 


December  jist.  Thank  God  for  this  good 
year!  I  asked  Him  for  this.  I  will  not  ask 
Him  for  another,  but  say  simply,  "Thy  will  be 
done!" 


80 


1893 

Sunday,  January  i$th.  .  .  .  The  discourse 
led  me  to  think  of  the  vast  work  that  needs  be 
done  in  disseminating  the  helpful,  hopeful  views 
of  the  new  Christianity — Christ's,  only  now  be 
ginning  to  be  rightly  and  universally  interpreted. 
It  seems  to  me  that  if  I  had  twenty  years  before 
me,  with  my  present  experience,  and  with  work 
ing  ability  even  such  as  I  now  have,  I  could  do 
something  in  this  line.  Perhaps  I  do  it  more 
than  I  know  of.  My  prayer  for  every  day  is 
now  that  I  may  do  in  it  something  worth  doing, 
not  for  personal  ends,  but  for  simple  and  sincere 
service.  This  at  any  rate  helps  to  start  the 
day  on  a  good  basis  of  intention. 

Tuesday,  April  nth.  .  .  .  Baron  Ricasoto, 
in  the  days  in  which  he  despaired  of  freeing 
his  country  from  its  numerous  tyrants,  devoted 
himself  to  the  education  of  his  daughter,  say 
ing:  "Perhaps  the  only  way  in  which  I  can 
be  of  use  in  some  small  degree,  to  the  country, 
is  by  giving  it  a  woman  of  noble  character."  I 
say  to  myself,  "No  other  hope  remains  to  you 
of  leaving  a  trace  of  your  footsteps  on  this  earth ; 
make  a  mother  worth  having." 


81 


1894 

January  ist,  1894.  I  take  possession  of  the 
New  Year  in  the  name  of  Faith,  Hope  and 
Charity. 

March  1st.  .  .  .  Speaking  of  the  difficulty 
with  which  ideas  already  received  are  allowed  to 
unfold  themselves  to  their  full  significance,  the 
inertia  of  mankind  barring  the  way:  "The  dear 
Lord,"  I  said,  "had  to  die  in  order  to  get  a  new 
testament  accepted  even  by  those  who  had  ac 
cepted  the  old  one." 

Sunday,  March  nth.  C.  G.  A.  preached 
a  funeral  sermon  on  Mrs.  Mary  Hemenway. 
As  he  opened  his  lips,  I  said  to  myself,  "What 
can  he  teach  us  that  her  life  has  not  taught  us  ?" 
The  sermon,  however,  was  most  instructive.  Such 
a  life  makes  an  epoch,  and  should  establish  a 
precedent.  If  one  woman  can  be  so  disinterested 
and  so  wise,  others  can  emulate  her  example.  I, 
for  one,  feel  that  I  shall  not  forget  this  forcible 
presentation  of  the  aspect  of  such  a  character,  of 
such  a  history.  God  send  that  her  mantle  may 
fall  upon  this  whole  community,  stimulating  each 
to  do  what  he  or  she  can  for  humanity. 

Wednesday,  May  30th.  Our  forefathers 
and  mothers  had  a  mighty  engine  for  awak 
ening  atttention  to  religion  in  their  children 
— the  terrible  fear  of  everlasting  punishment. 
We  have  not  this  fear  to  enforce  our  instruction, 
82 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

but  we  can  present  the  fear  of  something  quite 
as  bad,  the  failure  to  come  up  to  our  human 
measure  and  dignity,  the  lowering  of  the  moral 
level  of  the  community.  There  is  danger  in 
these  days  of  neglect  of  the  home  altar. 

July  ist.  Despite  my  severe  fatigue,  went  in 
town  to  church ;  desired  in  my  mind  to  have  some 
good  abiding  thought  given  to  me  to  work  for 
and  live  by.  The  best  thought  that  came  to  me 
was  something  like  this:  We  are  careful  of  our 
fortune  and  of  our  reputation.  We  are  not  care 
ful  enough  of  our  lives.  Society  is  built  of  these 
lives,  in  which  each  should  fit  his  or  her  place, 
like  a  stone  fitly  joined  by  the  builder.  We  die, 
but  the  life  we  have  lived  remains,  and  helps  to 
build  society  well  or  ill.  Later  on  I  thought 
that  it  sometimes  seems  as  if  a  rope  or  chain  of 
mercy  were  let  down  to  pull  some  of  us  out  of 
sin  and  degradation,  out  of  the  hell  of  passion. 
If  we  have  taken  hold  of  it  and  have  been 
rescued,  shall  we  not  work  to  have  others  drawn 
up  with  us?  At  such  moments,  I  remember  my 
old  wish  to  speak  to  the  prisoners,  never  fully 
realized. 

December  2nd.  Enjoyed  the  service  and  the 
Communion,  of  which  indeed  I  did  not  partake. 
But  such  a  good  thought  came  to  me  while  the 
others  went  to  the  altar.  This  was  that  the  en 
tirety  of  Humanity  is  the  body  which  the  Chris 
tian  spirit  is  to  vitalize  and  illumine.  The  eating 

83 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

of  one  bread  and  the  drinking  of  one  cup  in 
commemoration  of  that  heroic  feast  and  sorrow, 
symbolizes  for  me,  and  doubtless  for  many,  the 
great  unity  of  faith  and  feeling  which  true  re 
ligion  should  bring  among  the  peoples  of  the 
earth.  I  longed  to  be  able  to  write  a  sermon  to 
the  text:  ''This  is  my  body."  Possibly  I  may 
manage  to  do  this. 


84 


1895 

January  1st.  I  was  awake  very  early  and 
made  the  prayer  that  during  this  year  I  might  not 
say  one  uncharitable  word,  or  be  guilty  of  one 
ungenerous  action. 

January  20th.  To  church  with  joy  and 
thankfulness.  A  sermon  on  "The  tongue  and  its 
abuses,"  very  practical  and  good.  Was  per 
plexed  and  sad  at  waking  with  remembrance  of 
my  many  shortcomings.  The  text,  "Come  unto 
me,"  etc.,  presently  brought  me  light  and  com 
fort. 

June  2nd.  To  Communion  in  the  afternoon. 
The  minister  asked  whether  I  would  speak.  I 
told  what  I  had  felt  as  I  entered  the  church  that 
afternoon,  "a  sort  of  realization  of  the  scene  in 
that  upper  chamber,  its  gloom  and  its  glory. 
What  was  in  that  great  heart  whose  pulsations 
have  made  themselves  felt  down  to  our  own  time, 
and  all  over  the  world?  What  was  its  sorrow? 
It  bore  the  burthen  of  the  sorrows  and  distresses 
of  humanity,  and  we  who  pledge  him  here  in  this 
cup  are  bound  to  bear  our  part  of  that  burthen. 
Only  thus  shall  we  attain  to  share  in  that  festival 
of  joy  and  of  revealed  power  which  followed  the 
days  of  doubt  and  despair."  All  this  came  to  me 
like  a  flash.  I  have  written  it  down  from  mem 
ory  because  I  value  the  thought. 


Far  from  our  dwellings,  high  or  low, 

May  evil  deeds  remain, 
Let  none  of  us  consider  good 

What  brings  another  pain. 

In  all  that  makes  Life  beautiful 

We'll  study  to  excel, 
And  serve  and  bless  the  sacred  spot 

Where  we  are  called  to  dwell. 

These  pilgrim  steps  wax  faint  and  slow, 
And  weary  grows  the  load, 

But  hark,  the  golden  trumpets  blow 
Within  the  gates  of  God. 

Music  in  her  dulcet  voice 

And  in  the  well-tuned  lyre, 
Music  too  in  each  true  heart 

That  heavenward  doth  aspire. 


86 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

Saturday,  June  i$th.  I  am  glad  that  I 
have  at  last  found  out  that  the  battle  of  life  is 
an  unending  fight  against  the  evil  tendencies,  evil 
mostly  because  exceeding  right  measure,  which  we 
find  in  ourselves.  Strange  that  it  should  take  so 
long  to  find  this  out.  This  is  the  victory  which 
God  gives  us  when  we  have  fought  well  and 
faithfully.  Might  I  at  least  share  it  with  the 
saints  whom  I  have  known! 

Sunday,  July  14-th.  When  I  lay  down  to 
take  my  rest  before  dinner,  I  had  a  momentary 
sense  of  the  sweetness  and  relief  of  the  last  lying 
down.  This  was  a  new  experience  to  me,  as  I 
have  been  averse  to  any  thought  of  death  as  op 
posed  to  the  activity  which  I  love.  I  now  saw 
it  as  the  termination  of  all  fight  and  struggle,  and 
prayed  that  in  the  life  beyond  I  might  pay  some 
of  the  debts  of  affection  and  recompense  which 
I  have  failed  to  make  good  in  this  life. 

Saturday,  July  2"jth.  Work,  worship,  wel 
come.  These  three  words  will  do  for  a  motto 
of  the  life  which  I  now  lead,  in  which  these 
words  stand  for  my  ruling  objects,  "welcome," 
denoting  "hospitality,"  in  which  I  should  be  glad 
to  be  more  forward  than  I  have  been  of  late. 

July  28th.  O  God,  no  kingdom  is  worth 
praying  for  but  thine! 


A  SONG  FOR  THE  YOUTH  OF  THE 
CHRISTIAN    ENDEAVOR   SOCIETY 

Phalanx  of  youth,  so  fair  and  brave, 
Set  your  bright  banner  in  the  sky; 

O'er  minds  ennobled  let  it  wave, 
O'er  hearts  to  duty  ever  nigh. 

The  years  that  marshal  gallant  men, 
Passing,  withdraw  them  from  the  field; 

Our  leaders  resolute  of  ken, 

In  turn  to  Death's  stern  challenge  yield. 

Who  shall  uphold  what  valor  gained, 
When  those  who  led  the  fight  are  gone, 

When  noble  spirits,  nobly  trained, 
Fall,  from  the  contest,  one  by  one  ? 

Children  who  show  their  true  descent 
Fulfill  the  promise  of  their  sires, 

The  faith  unswerving  and  unbent, 
The  heart  unstained  by  low  desires. 

O  valiant  army  that  shall  be, 

Approach,  and  breathe  the  solemn  vow 

That  binds  to  truth's  high  chivalry! 
The  time  to  enroll  your  names  is  now. 

In  Heaven's  own  armory  of  light 
Availing  weapons  you  shall  find; 

Stronger  than  sword  and  cannon's  might 
The  prayerful  heart,  the  steadfast  mind. 

88 


THE    WALK   WITH    GOD 

The  cross,  with  Love's  own  glory  crowned, 
The  stripes  and  spangles  of  the  free, 

With  these  your  watchword  shall  resound, 
"Our  country,  God,  and  liberty." 

From  The  Golden  Rule. 


August  4th.  I  had  one  most  happy  sudden 
thought  in  church.  This  was  that  this  vital 
breath  which  sustains  me  is  related  to  that  which 
sustained  the  dear  Christ,  and  in  a  way,  descends 
from  the  same  source.  The  sermon  of  to-day, 
emphasizing  the  Human  Love  in  its  relation  to 
the  love  of  God,  suggested  to  me  many  of  my 
own  shortcomings  in  this  regard. 

Sunday,  September  1st.  The  Communion 
which  followed  the  sermon  brought  me  more 
light.  Beautiful  was  the  thought  of  this  festi 
val  of  all  time,  for  all  humanity — Christ,  the 
gift  of  God  to  the  whole  human  race.  It  seemed 
to  me  that  I  had  been  jealous  of  the  splendid 
shows  which  amuse  a  few  idle  rich  people,  giv 
ing  no  pleasure  to  the  multitude.  I  now  feel 
reassured  that  the  best  things  are  for  all. 

November  28th.  I  had  felt  a  special  discour 
agement  at  waking  this  morning.  Later  I 
sought  and  found  a  deliverance  from  this  in  the 
dear  Lord's  parable  of  the  lost  sheep. 


1896 

Sunday,  February  gth.  I  had  in  church  a  mo 
mentary  glimpse  of  the  meaning  of  Christ's  say 
ing,  "I  am  the  vine,  and  ye  are  the  branches." 
I  felt  how  the  source  of  our  spiritual  love  is  in 
the  heavenly  Fatherhood,  and  how  departing 
from  our  sense  of  this  we  become  empty  and 
barren.  It  was  a  moment  of  great  comfort. 
C.  G.  A.  wishes  me  to  preach  for  him  one  Sun 
day  in  March.  My  heart  seemed  to  ask  to-day 
before  service,  "Why  does  the  past  fade  so  out 
of  our  consciousness?  Why  can  we  not  retain 
our  hold  upon  it — its  dear  shapes,  our  departed 
friends?  What  is  the  true  inwardness  of 
death?"  .  .  . 

Sunday,  March  ist.  I  had  a  moment's 
glimpse  of  something  very  dear  and  deep,  namely : 
that  if  I  have  the  love  of  God  truly  in  my  heart, 
I  could  not  lose  it  even  in  Hell. 

March  2$th,  A  very  delightful  sermon  from 
C.  G.  A.  "Ye  are  the  light  of  the  world" ;  "Let 
your  light  so  shine,"  etc.  ...  I  feel  stirred 
by  this  sermon  to  take  a  more  active  part  and 
interest  in  religious  work.  I  pray  for  some  spe 
cial  call  or  opening  which  shall  point  that  way. 
I  cry,  Oh,  let  this  light  of  true  Christianity  pene 
trate  like  a  dart  of  fire  into  the  very  heart  of  the 
world's  heathendom.  Had  I  lived  a  more  con 
sistently  serious  life,  I  might  have  hoped  for 
90 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

such  a  mission,  yet  my  working  day  has  been  most 
mercifully  prolonged.  My  own  thought  on  en 
tering  our  church  and  seeing  it  adorned  with 
palms  was  the  immortal  character  of  heroic  ac 
tions.  For  us  the  dear  Christ  still  enters  Jerusa 
lem  on  Palm  Sunday;  he  is  still  crucified  on 
Good  Friday;  he  rises  from  the  tomb  on  Eas 
ter.  In  such  things,  once  is  always. 

Wednesday,  April  8th.  I  asked  in  my  prayer 
this  morning,  feeling  miserably  dull  and  weak, 
that  some  deed  of  help  and  love  might  be  given 
me  to  accomplish  to-day.  Between  12  M.  and 
i  P.M.  came  three  gentlemen  .  .  .  praying  me 
to  make  an  appeal  to  the  women  of  America  for 
their  Armenian  sisters,  who  are  destroying  them 
selves  in  many  instances  to  avoid  Turkish  out 
rage.  ...  I  felt  that  I  had  had  an  answer  to 
my  prayer. 

May  27th.  I  have  found  for  myself  a  text  in 
Psalm  85,  8th  verse.  "For  he  will  speak  peace 
unto  his  people,  but  let  them  not  turn  again  unto 
folly";  which  may  Heaven  forbid! 

July  5th.     Determined  that  I  would  go  to 

church  to-day.  I  intended  to  walk,  but  at 's 

instance  sent  for  a  cab  and  ordered  the  driver  to 
return.  On  entering  the  church  I  found  that 

was  to  preach,  and  found  too  that  there 

was  to  be  a  Communion  service.  Was  minded,  in 
view  of  the  order  already  given,  to  leave  after 

91 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

the  sermon,  which  was  a  very  literary  perform 
ance,  and  did  not  much  correspond  with  what  T 
wished  to  hear.  In  view  of  the  Communion, 
something  seemed  to  ask  me:  "Is  not  the  dear 
Christ's  Communion  worth  an  extra  half  dol 
lar?"  So  I  told  my  cabman  to  return  in  half 
an  hour,  and  went  back  into  the  church,  where 
the  sacred,  simple  rite  brought  me  many  dear 
and  intimate  thoughts,  and  a  sort  of  panorama  of 
dear  ones  who  have  passed  from  this  visible 
world,  including  my  two  departed  children.  As 
I  tasted  the  wine,  I  prayed  that  the  life  blood  of 
a  true  humanity  might  enter  into  my  veins,  bind 
ing  me  with  a  tie  of  Christ-like  love  to  my  fel 
low  creatures.  The  choir  sang  very  softly  three 
verses  of  "Nearer,  My  God,  to  Thee,"  and  I 
thought  that  I  felt  the  nearness. 

July  loth.  I  pray  this  morning  for  courage 
to  undertake  and  fervor  to  accomplish  something 
in  behalf  of  Christian  civilization  against  the 
tide  of  barbarism,  which  threatens  to  over- 
sweep  it. 

November  ist.  I  prayed  quite  earnestly  this 
morning  that  the  dimness  of  sight,  which  has 
lately  troubled  me,  might  disappear.  My  eyes 
are  really  better  to-day.  I  seemed  at  one  mo 
ment  during  the  service  to  see  myself  as  a  little 
child  in  the  Heavenly  Father's  nursery,  having 
played  my  naughty  pranks  (alas!)  and  left  my 
tasks  unperformed,  but  coming,  as  bed-time 
92 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

draws  near,  to  kiss  and  be  forgiven.  I  also 
thought  why  God  sends  His  rain  on  the  just  and 
the  unjust.  It  is  to  the  end  that  the  Good  shall 
constantly  increase  in  power  and  that  its  victory 
shall  know  no  interruption. 

December  jist.  And  so  farewell,  year  of 
many  mercies!  God  send  me  and  mine  another 
as  good! 


93 


1897 
THE  LORD'S  SUPPER 

From  the  lips  of  Christ  this  goblet  comes 

That  here  you  tender  me, 
From  the  lips  whose  summons  woke  the  dead 

In  ancient  Bethany. 

The  lips  whose  music  thrills  the  world 

With  high  beatitudes; 
The  lips  that  gave  command  to  feed 

The  hungering  multitudes. 

Oh !  bitter  was  the  draught  to  him, 

On  the  chill  verge  of  death, 
Who  at  the  banquet  gave  this  pledge 

Of  love  surpassing  faith. 

Put  far  from  me  the  stains  of  earth, 

My  heart  in  twain  be  riven 
For  him  who  through  the  centuries  saith, 

"Thy  sins  be  all  forgiven." 


94 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

January  1st.  (Written  on  the  fly-leaf  of  the 
Journal.)  The  good  God  make  me  grateful  for 
this  new  year,  of  which  I  am  allowed  to  see  the 
beginning.  Thy  kingdom  come!  I  have  many 
wishes,  but  this  prayer  will  carry  them  all. 

January  3rd.  Woke  early  with  a  choking 
throat,  a  feverish  pulse  and  an  aching  head. 
Supposed  myself  sick  for  some  days  to  come,  but 
determined  to  go  to  church.  A  helpful  sermon 
on  Hope.  I,  alas!  was  heavy  with  my  cold 
and  drowsed  somewhat.  The  Communion  serv 
ice  which  followed  was  truly  comforting,  uplift 
ing  and  delightful.  Among  other  thoughts,  this 
came  to  me:  I  thought  myself  at  the  Heavenly 
Father's  feast  in  poor  and  degraded  garments, 
corresponding  to  my  own  merits.  Before  any 
one  could  exclaim:  "How  came  she  here?"  the 
Heavenly  One  Himself  seemed  to  cover  me  with 
a  beautiful  garment,  so  that  I  should  not  be  out 
of  harmony  with  the  occasion.  This  waking 
vision  moved  me  to  many  tears.  I  shall  try  to 
hold  fast  its  meaning. 

May  27th.  This  is  my  78th  birthday.  If 
the  good  God  sees  fit  to  grant  me  another  year, 
may  He  help  me  to  fill  it  with  good  work. 

June  26th.  Had  a  little  time  of  quiet  thought 
this  morning,  in  which  I  seemed  to  see  how  the 
intensity  of  individual  desire  would  make  chaos 

95 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

in  the  world  of  men  and  women  if  there  were 
not  a  conquering  and  reconciling  principle  of 
harmony  above  them  all.  This  to  my  mind  can 
be  no  other  than  the  infinite  wisdom  and  infinite 
love  which  we  call  God. 

December  i8th.  When  I  lay  down  to  take  my 
nap  before  dinner,  I  had  a  sudden  thought — a 
vision  of  the  glory  of  God  in  the  face  of  Jesus 
Christ.  I  seemed  to  see  how  the  human  could 
in  a  way  reflect  the  glory  of  the  divine,  giving 
not  a  mechanical  but  an  affectional  and  spiritual 
re-showing  of  the  great  unfathomable  glory. 


96 


1898 

January  1st.  May  God  bless  this  New  Year 
to  me  and  mine.  May  it  bring  true  peace  and 
divine  wisdom  to  the  peoples  of  the  earth. 

May  I  in  some  way  do  something  to  help  this. 

January  3 1st.  Have  made  a  special  prayer 
that  my  mind  may  be  less  occupied  with  my  own 
shortcomings,  and  more  with  all  that  keeps  our 
best  hopes  alive.  Felt  little  able  to  write,  but 
produced  a  good  page  on  the  principle:  Nulla 
dies  sine  linea. 

Friday,  May  sjth.  Dear  Heavenly  Father, 
thanks  for  the  life  which  Thou  gavest  me,  sev 
enty-nine  years  ago  to-day.  What  a  boon  has 
this  been !  To  gain  the  experience  of  later  years 
with  faculties  unimpaired  and  bodily  senses  still 
preserved.  .  .  .  Dear  Lord,  if  my  life  is  pro 
longed,  let  it  be  for  good,  for  something  better 
than  I  have  yet  done.  Yet  for  that  even,  end 
less  thanks. 

Sunday,  June  I2th.  To  the  dear  church  in  a 
dull  mood.  The  cloud  suddenly  lifted  and  I 
felt  myself  happily  swept  into  the  divine  order, 
so  that  I  dared  to  say  to  God,  "I  love  Thee!" 
A  thrice  blessed  moment,  pledging  to  renewed  ef 
fort  and  good  service. 

December  5th.  Woke  very  early  and  had  a 
long  and  desperate  worry  over  my  money  mat- 

97 


ters. 
pray 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

A  prayer  bettered  my  state  of  mind.  I 
pray  for  courage  and  strength  and  not  to  break 
down  in  health,  or  in  resolution  to  work,  as  well 
as  I  can,  to  the  utmost. 

December  Jth.  Awoke  with  my  usual  sinking 
heart.  Prayed  for  a  loving  and  contrite  heart, 
a  wise  and  patient  mind,  and  physical  strength  to 
finish  all  that  I  have  in  mind. 

December  nth.  Enjoyed  my  evening's 
preaching  greatly.  Felt  to  offer  the  principal 
prayer.  All  day  I  had  thought  of  "Thine  is  the 
glory,"  and  had  wished  to  express  my  thought  in 
it.  In  my  prayer  I  quoted  the  whole  phrase  and 
said:  "Lord,  let  me  live  in  Thy  kingdom;  our 
weakness  may  rely  upon  Thy  power;  our  dark 
lives  may  be  brightened  by  Thy  glory."  After 
the  service  many  people  came  forward  to  thank 
me.  One  lady  said:  "Mrs.  Howe,  your  prayer 
carried  me  to  the  very  gates  of  heaven." 


1899 

Thursday,  May  25th.  Emerson  was  as  great 
in  what  he  did  not  say,  as  in  what  he  said. 
Second-class  talent  tells  the  whole  story,  reasons 
everything  out;  great  genius  suggests  even  more 
than  it  says. 

Saturday,  October  2ist.  ...  I  must  re 
member  that  this  may  be  my  last  summer  here, 
or  anywhere  on  earth,  but  must  bear  in  mind 
that  it  is  best  to  act  with  a  view  to  prolonged 
life,  since  without  this  outlook,  it  is  very  hard 
for  us  to  endeavor,  or  to  do  our  best.  .  .  . 

Sunday,  November  igth.  ...  I  had  prayed 
for  some  good  thought  of  God.  This  came  to 
me  in  the  shape  of  a  sudden  perception  to  this 
effect:  "I  am  in  the  Father's  house  already." 
This  was  a  comforting  glimpse,  but  only  a 
glimpse,  passing  very  quickly. 

Thursday,  November  joth.  .  .  .  The  An 
glican  (Communion)  service,  though  impressive, 
shocks  me  by  offering  the  body  and  the  blood  of 
Christ.  In  what  mystical  sense  the  dear  Lord 
told  his  disciples  to  eat  the  one  and  drink  the 
other,  I  do  not  know,  but  to  me  the  Eucharist  is 
a  simple  feast  of  gratitude  in  which  remembrance 
is  far  more  congenial  than  this  allegorical  partak 
ing,  which  the  Romanist  doctrine  of  the  real 
presence  makes  possible. 

99 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

(From  a  note-book  of  this  period) 

O,  Thou  whose  gifts  are  beyond  words,  Thou 
in  whose  loving  Fatherhood  we  are  content  to 
abide,  help  us  to  know  that  Thou  art  near  us 
to-day  and  every  day  of  our  life  on  earth. 

Thou  hast  wonderfully  opened  to  us  the 
knowledge  of  Good  and  Evil  and  hast  endowed 
us  with  the  ability  to  pursue  the  one  and  to  avoid 
the  other. 

Give  us,  we  pray  Thee,  that  faith  in  the  con 
quering  power  of  good  deeds  and  purposes  which 
may  enable  us  to  contend  successfully  against  the 
infirmities  and  temptations  to  which  our  nature 
is  subject.  May  a  sense  of  the  true  values  of 
life  keep  us  in  the  path  appointed  for  us.  May 
we  seek  the  patience  of  the  saints,  the  wisdom  of 
the  prophets,  and  the  self-devotion  of  the  mar 
tyrs,  and  may  our  worship  give  us  a  place  in  the 
great  Church  Universal  of  Love  and  service  for 
ever.  In  Christ's  name,  Amen. 

Sunday,  December  3rd.  .  .  .  Without  the 
painful  consciousness  of  my  sins,  how  could  I 
have  had  the  sense  of  the  love  and  mercy  of  God 
which  makes  this  moment  so  beautiful  to 
me?  ... 

Wednesday,  December  ijth.  ...  As  I  knelt 
by    my    bedside    before    lying    down,    I    said: 
"I  thank  God  that  I  have  been  heart  and  hand 
in  touch  with  the  people  of  my  time." 
100 


1900 

Friday,  March  30th.  ...  Had  a  special 
good  moment  this  morning  before  rising.  Felt 
that  God  had  granted  me  a  good  deal  of  heaven, 
while  yet  on  earth.  So  the  veil  lifts  sometimes, 
not  for  long.  .  .  . 

Tuesday,  May  8th.  .  .  .  Spoke,  I  think,  of 
the  fact  that  it  takes  the  whole  of  life  to  learn 
the  lessons  of  life.  Dwelt  a  little  on  the  fact 
that  fools  are  not  necessarily  underwitted.  Nay, 
may  be  people  of  genius,  the  trouble  being  that 
they  do  not  learn  from  experience. 

Friday,  May  25th.  Went  in  afternoon  to 
Unitarian  Meeting  at  Tremont  Temple.  .  .  . 
Eliot  asked  if  I  would  give  a  word  of  benediction. 
I  did  so,  thanking  God  earnestly  in  my  heart 
for  granting  me  this  sweet  office,  which  seemed 
to  lift  my  soul,  above  much  which  has  disturbed 
it  of  late.  Why  is  He  so  good  to  me?  Surely 
not  to  destroy  me  at  last! 

April  23rd.  Had  a  sort  of  dream  vision  of 
the  dear  Christ  going  through  Beacon  Street  in 
shadow,  and  then  in  his  glory.  It  was  only  the 
flash  of  a  moment's  thought. 

July  idth.  While  in  church  I  had  a  new 
thought  of  the  energy  and  influence  of  Christ's 
teaching.  "Ask  and  ye  shall  receive,"  etc. 

101 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

This  little  series  of  commands  all  incite  the 
hearers  to  action:  ask,  seek,  knock.  I  should 
love  to  write  a  sermon  on  this,  but  fear  that  my 
sermonizing  days  are  over.  Alas ! 

Sunday,  April  8th.  Christ's  victory  was  in 
the  fact  of  his  death,  as  he  invited  and  met  it, 
not  in  what  people  said  of  him  after  it. 


102 


Spite  of  wind  and  current, 
I'll  hold  on  my  course, 
Match  the  wayward  torrent 
With  a  spirit  force. 

Lo,  a  word,  a  golden, 
In  my  cradle  laid, 
I  am  so  beholden, 
It  must  be  obeyed. 

I  must  soothly  speak  it, 
Ever  and  anon, 
Tho'  no  hearer  seek  it, 
Tho'  no  crown  be  won. 

As  the  orient-prophet 
Alexander  slew 

Would  have  brought  him  profit, 
Telling  what  he  knew ; 

So  I  breathe  my  sentence 
Oft,  in  many  a  spot, 
It  had  been  my  repentance, 
Had  I  said  it  not. 

Say,  if  death  should  find  me 
Singing,  still  unheard, 
Trouble  should  not  bind  me : 
I  have  said  my  word. 


103 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

Sunday,  June  3rd.  At  breakfast  had  some 
overpowering  thoughts  of  the  goodness  of  God. 
Prayed  for  the  power  of  true  worship.  Service 
at  church  delightful.  An  inspired  Whitsunday 
sermon  from  C.  G.  A.  Before  church  had  a 
thought  of  some  sweet  spirit  asking  to  go  to  Hell 
to  preach  to  the  people  there.  Thought  that  if 
he  truly  fulfilled  his  office,  he  would  not  leave 
even  that  forlorn  pastorate. 

Sunday,  June  ijth.  .  .  .  To  church,  where 
I  had  one  of  the  blessed  glimpses  which  sometimes 
relieve  my  spiritual  darkness.  It  came  in  this 
thought:  if  I  were  in  the  depths  of  Hell  itself,  I 
could  keep  hold  of  the  divine  hand.  I  felt  such 
an  assurance  of  the  divine  love  and  mercy  that  it 
lit  up  for  me  the  whole  service. 

Thursday,  July  26th.  Have  prayed  to-day 
that  I  may  not  find  life  dull.  This  prolongation 
of  my  days  on  earth  is  so  precious  that  I  ought 
not  to  cease  for  one  moment  to  thank  God  for 
it.  I  enjoy  my  reading  as  much  as  ever,  but  I 
do  feel  very  much  the  narrowing  of  my  personal 
relations  by  death.  How  rich  was  I  in  sisters, 
brothers,  elders!  It  seems  to  me  now  as  if  I 
had  not  at  all  appreciated  these  treasures  of  af 
fection. 

September  2nd.     I  had  before  service  began  a 
clear  thought  that  self  is  death,  and  deliverance 
from  its  narrow  limitations,  the  truest  emanci- 
104 


THE   WALK   WITH    GOD 

pation.  In  my  heart  I  gave  thanks  to  God  for 
all  measure  in  which  I  have  attained,  or  tried  to 
attain,  this  liberation.  It  seemed  to  me  that  the 
one  moment  of  this  which  we  could  perfectly  at 
tain  would  be  an  immortal  joy. 

October  2ist.  Thinking  about  "how  the  pure 
in  heart  can  see  God,"  it  suddenly  came  to  me 
that  we  can  see  Him  (reflected)  in  the  faces  of 
His  saints — rather,  we  see  something  of  His 
glory  thus.  Went  to  Channing  Church  to  hear 
David  Muzzey  preach.  He  read  the  parable  of 
the  prodigal  son  beautifully,  and  gave  me  a  feel 
ing  of  the  way  in  which  the  dear  Master  might 
have  told  the  story.  This  seemed  like  a  little 
glimpse  of  the  great  glory.  The  sermon,  which 
was  very  eloquent  and  delightful,  was  on  forgive 
ness. 

October  23rd.  Prayed  last  evening  that  I 
might  not  have  the  dreadful  depression  at  wak 
ing,  and  did  not  have  it. 

December  25th.  "Let  us  pray  for  the  whole 
estate  of  Christ's  Church  militant." 

The  Anglican  service  says  this,  and  I  echo  it 
to-day.  The  Christian  Church,  righting  against 
the  dark  and  dreadful  evils  of  society,  armed 
with  the  faith,  which  is  overcoming  the  world, 
and  which,  I  think,  finds  it  best  interpretation  in 
the  Saints  and  Fathers  of  our  Unitarian  denomi 
nation. 

105 


1901 

January  Jth.  I  have  had  a  morning  of  vision- 
ing,  lying  in  bed.  "Be  still  and  know  that  I  am 
God,"  seemed  to  be  my  sentence.  I  thought  of 
the  Magdalen's  box  of  spikenard,  whose  odor, 
when  the  box  was  opened,  filled  the  house.  The 
separate  religious  convictions  of  the  sects  seemed 
to  me  like  so  many  boxes  of  ointment,  exceeding 
precious  while  shut  up;  but  I  thought  also  that 
the  dear  Lord  would  one  day  break  these  sepa 
rate  boxes,  and  that  then  their  fragrance  would 
fill  the  whole  earth,  which  is  His  house. 


106 


THE  CLOSED  GENTIAN 

Thou  promise  of  a  glory  unfulfilled, 
Enclosed  as  if  some  frost  thy  heart  had  chilled ; 
Thy  blue  is  stolen  from  the  vault  above ; 
Surely,  the  golden  secret  of  thy  love 
Is  star-distilled,  too  precious  for  revealing 
For  mean  delight's  unconsecrated  feeling. 

In  my  life's  garden  grow  such  flowers  as  these, 
Unfolding  not  to  sunshine  nor  to  breeze, 
Their  outer  semblance  to  the  world  fair  shown, 
Their  inner  beauty  seen  of  God  alone. 


107 


November  ist.  Question  is,  can  I  get  through 
with  this  removal  (from  Newport  to  Boston) 
and  live  through  it?  My  Heavenly  Friend  must 
help  me.  This  departure  is  a  sad  one  for  me, 
for,  like  John  M.  Forbes  when  he  left  Naushon 
for  the  last  time,  I  say  to  myself,  "Never  again, 
perhaps."  Yet  my  fear  is  rather  that  I  may  live 
too  long,  losing  my  faculties,  and  perhaps  bowed 
down  with  infirmity.  Fortunately  I  feel  that 
"God  knoweth  which  is  best." 

November  2nd.  I  leave  this  dear  place  to 
day,  thanking  God  for  a  most  precious  summer, 
and  trusting  Him  for  all  that  is  to  follow. 


108 


Who  are  you  that  care  for  me 
When  before  my  desk  I  sit, 
Taking  measure  of  my  wit, 
Waiting  on  unmeasured  fire 
Which  my  fellows  should  inspire? 

Beauty  at  gay  banquet  shining? 
Bard  in  lonely  garret  pining? 
Not  for  you  my  snare  is  thrown, 
You  have  idols  of  your  own. 

But  to  some  discouraged  spirit 
Which  the  muse-gift  would  inherit, 
But  for  clouding  griefs  and  cares 
Shaming  youth  with  silver  hairs, 
Waiter  at  the  closed  door 
That  shall  open  nevermore. 

Some  worn  mother,  cradle-weary, 
Wife,  whose  loveless  days  grow  dreary , 
Dreamer,  cheated  of  fruition, 
Learner,  hopeful  of  tuition, 
Soul,  that  bravely  did  begin 
But,  encountering  mortal  sin, 
Withers  like  a  rose  that  grieves 
O'er  the  canker  in  its  leaves. 

Boldly  unto  these  I  cry: 
"Heaven  will  not  your  suit  deny. 
Courage  draw  from  Nature's  breast : 
Scan  the  roll  of  martyrs  blest, 

109 


THE   WALK   WITH    GOD 

To  a  swifter  measure  move, 
A  diviner  armor  prove; 
Lift  thy  heart,  be  of  good  cheer 
While  I  whisper  in  thine  ear: 
'Hope  forsake  not,  help  is  near.' " 


110 


1902 

Sunday,  February  1 6th.  Have  thought  a 
good  deal  this  morning  of  this  cream  of  genius  in 
which  the  fervent  heat  of  youth  fuses  conviction 
and  imagination  and  gives  the  world  its  great 
masters  and  masterpieces.  It  cannot  outlast  the 
length  of  human  life,  of  which  it  is  the  poetry. 
Age  follows  it  with  slow  philosophy,  but  can 
only  strengthen  the  outposts  which  Youth  has 
gained  with  daring  flight.  Both  are  divinely  or 
dained  and  most  blessed.  Of  the  dear  Christ  the 
world  had  only  this  transcendent  efflorescence. 
I  said  to  Ames  yesterday,  "I  find  in  the  Hebrew 
prophets  all  the  doctrine  which  I  find  in  Christ's 
teaching."  He  said,  "Yes,  it  is  there  seminally." 
We  agreed  that  it  was  the  life  which  made  the 
difference. 

May  ^oth.  I  wish  now  to  find  time  to  write 
a  sermon  on  "the  glory  of  God  in  the  face  of 
Jesus  Christ." 

Sunday,  June  I5th.  .  .  .  O  Thou,  nearest 
and  dearest,  help  us  to  feel  Thy  presence,  and  to 
make  it  felt ;  help  us  to  feel  that  Thou  art  not  a 
dream  of  philosophy,  nor  a  legend  of  old  world 
story,  but  an  ever-present  help  and  consolation, 
the  strength  of  our  strength,  the  life  of  our  souls. 
Help  us  also  to  realize  the  importance  of  our  life 
on  earth.  What  a  gift  is  this!  How  full  of 
beauty,  of  comfort,  and  of  lessons  of  deep  import ! 

ill 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

Let  us  not  deem  what  we  do  of  no  consequence. 
Let  us  remember  that  our  work  is  Thy  work,  and 
that  we  must  account  to  Thee  for  its  faithful  per 
formance.  Teach  us  that  every  task  of  ours 
faithfully  performed  will  stand  upon  Thy  record, 
and  that  every  neglected  one  will  leave  there  a 
melancholy  blank." 

Saturday,  July  5th.  (Written  to  a  young  girl. ) 
.  .  .  Get  all  the  education  that  you  can.  Cul 
tivate  habits  of  studious  thought  with  all  that 
books  can  teach.  The  fulfillment  of  the  nearest 
duty  gives  the  best  education.  .  .  . 

July  nth.  Finished  rough  draft  of  sermon. 
I  think  that  the  dear  Lord  might  grant  me  to 
speak  a  few  times  more  even  if  it  should  shorten 
my  term  of  days  a  little. 

Monday,  November  ijth.  I  had  this  morn 
ing  so  strong  a  feeling  of  the  goodness  of  the 
divine  Parent  in  the  experience  of  my  life,  espe 
cially  of  its  most  trying  period,  that  I  had  to  cry 
out,  "What  shall  I,  who  have  received  so  much, 
give  in  return?"  I  felt  that  I  must  show  that 
forbearance  and  forgiveness  to  others  which  the 
ever  blessed  One  has  shown  to  me.  . 


112 


FROM  NOTEBOOKS  OF  1902 
Notebook  No.  4 

All  error  was  in  its  time  intended  truth.  It 
is  on  account  of  this  that  its  removal  asks  a  rev 
erent  hand,  not  a  rash  one. 

My  best  prayer  would,  I  think,  be  that  which 
should  ask  God  to  enable  me  to  feel  that  love 
and  reverence  for  the  human  race  which  they 
deserve. 

Notebook  No.  12.     Good  Friday 

This  festival  appears  to  me  one  of  the  deepest 
that  men  keep — the  great  depth  of  sorrow,  not 
only  for  the  sufferings  of  the  dear  Christ,  but  for 
the  wickedness  and  cruelty  of  which  human  na 
ture  is  capable,  as  shown  in  those  who  persecuted 
him  while  living,  and  who  put  him  to  an  agoniz 
ing  death.  I  have  been  thinking  now  of  a  day, 
years  ago,  when  I  sat  with  my  dear  daughter  in 
the  Garden  of  Gethsemane,  and  the  remem 
brance  of  this  dear  church  was  present  with  me. 
I  asked  permission  to  sing  a  hymn  which  we  have 
often  sung  in  this  place: 

"Go  to  dark  Gethsemane, 

Ye  who  feel  the  tempter's  power." 

But  this  is  also  a  festival  of  the  brightest  hope 
that  mortals  can  know.     I  feel  this  to-day  espe- 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

cially  after  hearing  the  notice  read  this  morning, 
of  a  meeting  in  which  ministers  of  so  many 
creeds  are  to  come  together,  Catholic,  Jew,  Epis 
copalian  and  Unitarian,  to  take  counsel  concern 
ing  the  duty  of  the  State.  It  seems  to  me  that, 
in  the  older  time,  one  denomination  was  afraid 
that  the  love  of  God  would  not  suffice  for  all  re 
ligionists.  But  now  we  seem  to  have  reached  a 
point  at  which  we  perceive  something  of  its 
abundance.  It  flows  and  overflows,  and  could 
fill  the  whole  Universe  with  its  fullness. 

I  prayed  this  morning  that  I  might  find  to-day 
a  real  Pentecost — I  feel  that  it  has  been  one. 

(Church  of  the  Disciples — May  i8th,  1902. 
I  have  written  this  from  remembrance,  for  my 
self,  not  for  oihers.) 


114 


1903 

Tuesday,  January  ijth.  .  .  .  The  education 
of  a  savage  race  is  a  slow  process.  "We  our 
selves  do  not  know  how  long  it  took  to  civilize 
our  ancestors,  how  many  ajons  there  are  between 
Babel  and  Boston." 

April  I2th.  (After  regretting  her  physical  in 
ability  to  attend  church.)  I  had  ...  a  feel 
ing  that  I  could  not  be  banished  from  God's 
presence,  that  I  should  find  Him  everywhere. 

Wednesday,  May  27th.  .  .  .  My  life  has 
been  crowned  with  undeserved  blessings  and  with 
honors  which  I  do  my  best  to  deserve.  My 
prayer  is  that  death  may  find  me  at  work  for 
something  worth  working  for,  but  I  pray  most 
now  for  those  whom  I  shall  leave  behind  me, 
that  their  comforts  and  good  service  may  ever 
increase.  . 


Methought  I  was  a  little  child 

That  came  from  wandering  home  at  night, 
From  errant  plays  and  gambols  wild 

To  where  a  hearth  was  broad  and  bright. 

Voices  of  welcome  and  of  cheer 
Brought  music  to  my  eager  ear, 
And  as  I  knelt  for  nightly  prayer, 
Father  and  Mother  love  were  there. 


116 


Thursday,  May  28th.  My  prayer  for  the 
new  year  of  my  life  beginning  to-day  is,  that  in 
some  work  that  I  shall  undertake  I  may  help  to 
make  clear  the  goodness  of  God  to  some  who 
need  to  know  more  of  it  than  they  do.  ... 

Monday,  June  22nd. 

"The  stars  against  the  tyrant  fought 
In  famous  days  of  old. 
The  stars  in  freedom's  banner  wrought 
Shall  the  wide  earth  enfold." 

Thursday,  June  25th.  .  .  .  The  William  James 
book  which  I  finished  yesterday  left  in  my  mind 
a  painful  impression  of  doubt ;  a  God  who  should 
be  only  my  better  self,  or  an  impersonal  pervad 
ing  influence.  These  were  suggestions  which 
left  me  very  lonely  and  forlorn.  To-day,  as  I 
thought  it  all  over,  the  God  of  Abraham,  Isaac 
and  Jacob  seemed  to  come  back  to  me;  the  God 
of  Christ,  and  his  saints  and  martyrs.  I  said  to 
myself :  "Let  me  be  steeped  in  the  devotion  of  the 
psalm,  and  of  Paul's  epistles!"  I  took  up 
Coquerel's  sermons  on  the  Lord's  prayer,  simple, 
beautiful,  positive.  .  .  . 

Sunday,  July  5th.  (After  a  Communion 
service.)  ...  I  said  to  myself:  "I  am  morally 
a  poor,  lame,  distorted  cripple,  how  can  I  walk 
in  the  Christian  ranks?"  It  seemed  as  if  God 
answered,  "I  have  all  eternity  to  straighten  you 
out."  Then  the  cup  seemed  to  bring  me  the 

117 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

very  essence  of  Christ's  sacrifice,  his  very  heart's 
blood,  so  to  speak. 

August  nth.  Have  had  a  wonderful  com 
forting  vision  of  God's  love  and  wisdom.  It 
seemed  to  me  that  this  dearest  moment  might  in 
dicate  some  trouble  near  at  hand,  for  which  it 
might  give  me  strength  and  courage. 

August  3ist.  I  seemed  to  have  an  answer  to 
prayer  this  morning.  I  had  prayed  to  have  a 
fresher  sense  of  Christ's  personality  in  my  mind. 
At  my  early  waking  I  had  such  a  refreshment. 
My  mind  seemed  to  follow  him  in  his  works  and 
words  even  to  the  end. 

Sunday,  September  6th.  .  .  .  The  Commu 
nion  service  was  very  comforting.  Especially 
did  Christ's  words  come  to  me,  "Abide  in  me," 
etc.  I  felt  that  if  I  would  abide  in  him,  old  as 
I  am,  I  could  still  do  some  good  work.  "Yes, 
my  strong  friend,"  my  heart  said,  "I  will  abide  in 
thee."  .  .  . 

Sunday,  November  8th.  ...  In  late  after 
noon  some  visioning,  i.e.,  lying  down  to  rest  and 
asking  and  answering  questions  in  my  mind : 

Question:  Can  anything  exceed  the  delight 
of  the  first  mutual  understanding  of  two  lovers? 

Answer :  This  has  its  sacredness  and  its  place, 
but  even  better  is  the  large  affection  which  em 
braces  things  human  and  divine,  God  and  Man. 
118 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

Question:    Are  Saviour  and  Saints  alive  now? 

Answer:  If  you  believe  that  God  is  just, 
they  must  be.  They  gave  all  for  His  truth;  He 
owes  them  immortality.  These  thoughts  helped 
and  satisfied  me,  particularly  the  last  one. 

November  2Qth.  This  came  into  my  mind, 
apropos  of  reformers  generally.  "Dost  thou  so 
carry  thy  light  as  to  throw  it  upon  thyself,  or 
upon  thy  theme?"  This  appears  a  legitimate 
question. 

December  nth.  Had  a  bright  glimpse  of  the 
overcoming  goodness  of  God  in  the  early  morn 
ing. 


119 


Give  me  room  on  your  shelf,  I  pray ; 
Take  me  down  to  read  some  day. 

I've  lived  in  an  heroic  age, 
And  in  my  mind,  as  on  a  page, 
Much  of  its  wondrous  way  is  writ, 
Much  of  its  wisdom  and  its  wit, 
Its  holy  passion,  nobler  still, 
Its  majesty  of  human  will 
Crystallized  in  many  a  deed, 
In  many  a  counsel,  good  at  need. 

We  are  out  of  fashion  now 
My  rhymes  and  I,  oh !  well  I  trow, 
Year  eighteen  hundred  fifty-three 
Witnessed  no  bond  twixt  you  and  me. 

And  yet  the  sentence  I  have  said 
Was  on  my  infant  cradle  laid : 

"Write,  though  nobody  should  read. 
Speak,  tho'  not  a  soul  should  heed." 

I  have  written  of  my  day, 
I  have  said  my  honest  say, 
Suffer  me  on  thy  shelf,  I  pray. 


120 


1904 

January  1st.  I  renew  my  prayer  that  I  may 
not  waste  the  days  which  remain  to  me,  few  or 
many. 

February  Jth.  ...  I  came  into  church  in  no 
spiritual  state  of  mind,  but  seemed  to  say  to  God : 
"I  cannot  visit  thee,  do  Thou  visit  me."  .  .  . 

I  spoke  of  the  small  beginning. 

.  .  .  What  could  one  man  do?  He  did 
come  upon  the  word  which  was  to  resolve  all  the 
discords  of  the  human  world;  to  show  mankind 
that  they  were  natural  friends,  not  enemies,  mem 
bers  of  one  vast  household,  the  family  of  God's 
children.  I  said:  "This  light  which  was  in 
Christ's  mind  illuminates  the  whole  world  with 
its  glory.  The  word  spoken,  the  life  lived  two 
thousand  years  ago,  is  nearer  to  us  than  what 
happened  last  year  or  last  week.  It  is  ever  with 
us,  the  same  yesterday,  to-day  and  forever." 

February  I4th.  I  had  prayed  for  some  spe 
cial  good  thought  at  church,  and  found  it  in  a 
vivid  feeling  of  the  redeeming  power  and  grace 
of  God,  through  which  our  errors  are  remedied 
and  our  good  efforts  aided.  I  thought  of  my 
own  beloved  family,  deservedly  held  in  honor  and 
esteem,  and  felt  how  little  credit  I  have  deserved 
for  this  happy  result  of  my  married  life — the 
splendid,  high-toned  father,  and  the  divine  Provi 
dence,  have  filled  up  what  my  shortcomings  have 
left  wanting. 

121 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

April  ijth.  I  have  hoped  to  die  quietly  in 
this  house  (in  Boston)  but  it  is  possible,  old  as 
I  am,  that  God  may  have  work  for  me  to  do  else 
where.  If  so,  I  shall  be  content  to  fall  wherever 
He  shall  appoint. 

June  I2th.  Remember  to  forget  your  trou 
bles,  but  don't  forget  to  remember  your  blessings. 

August  idth.  Very  tired,  but  will  not  adver 
tise  the  fact.  This  morning  a  text  came  to  me 
with  uncommon  clearness:  "God  was  in  Christ, 
reconciling  the  world  to  himself."  This  stamps 
Christianity  as  a  fresh  revelation  of  the  divine. 
It  was  in  Christ,  and  was  a  power  of  reconcili 
ation  between  the  dreaded  power  of  God  and 
sinful,  imperfect  man. 

October  5th.  (She  quotes  some  words  spoken 
by  her  before  a  Peace  Congress.)  .  .  .  "Let 
me  remind  you  that  there  is  one  word  even  more 
holy  than  Peace;  namely,  Justice.  It  is  anterior 
in  our  intellectual  perceptions.  The  impulse 
which  causes  men  to  contend  against  injustice  is 
a  divine  one,  deeply  implanted  in  the  human 
breast.  It  would  be  wrong  to  attempt  to  thwart 
it."  .  .  .  My  heart  was  so  full  that  it  said  to 
me,  "At  the  foot  of  the  cross,  there  thank  God 
for  this  word  given  to  thee,  and  ask  the  dear 
Christ  if  it  was  according  to  his  desire." 

October  Qth.     I  have  felt  more  strongly  than 
ever  of  late  that  God  is  the  only  comforter.     In 
122 


THE    WALK   WITH    GOD 

my  rather  foolish  disappointment  about  my 
speech  on  Friday  evening,  my  one  cry  was,  "Thou 
only  canst  console  me  for  what  may  have  been 
partly  my  fault,"  for  I  should  assuredly  have 
had  leave  to  speak  if  I  had  asked  for  it.  To-day 
has  brought  me  full  consolation  in  a  view  of  what 
I  might  yet  do  if  life  and  strength  are  still 
vouchsafed  to  me.  With  this  came  a  sad  retro 
spect  of  the  wasted  opportunities  of  my  life. 
These  great  serious  things  were  always  present 
to  work  for  in  days  in  which  I  exerted  myself  to 
amuse  others  and  myself  too.  It  is  quite  true 
that  I  have  never  given  up  serious  thought  and 
study,  but  I  have  not  made  the  serious  use  of  my 
powers  which  I  ought  to  have  made.  The  Peace 
Congress  has  left  upon  my  mind  a  strong  impres 
sion  of  what  the  lovers  of  humanity  could  accom 
plish  if  they  were  all  and  always  in  earnest.  I 
seem  to  hope  for  a  fresh  consecration,  for  oppor 
tunities  truly  to  serve,  and  for  the  continuance  of 
that  gift  of  the  word  which  is  sometimes  granted 
me. 

October  2 3rd.  My  last  Sunday  in  this  dear 
place.  (Oak  Glen,  Newport.)  Thank  God 
most  earnestly  for  what  I  have  enjoyed  this  sea 
son,  and  for  what  He  has  allowed  me  to  do  in 
the  way  of  public  service.  If  I  come  here  no 
more,  may  blessings  rest  upon  this  place  where 
my  days  have  been  most  precious. 

November  6th.  Not  well  enough  for  church; 
depression  so  severe  in  early  morning  that  I  felt 

123 


THE   WALK   WITH    GOD 

I  must  force  myself  to  render  service  to  some 
one,  or  else  find  my  days  intolerable,  so  I  have 

writ  a  letter  in   Italian   to  ,  to  please 

Maud,  who  has  sent  him  her  book  just  out. 


124 

x 


1905 
GOOD  FRIDAY 

Why  is  it  good?    This  ever-mournful  day 
That  saw  the  Saviour  walk  his  deathward  way, 
The  cruel  cross  upon  his  shoulders  bound, 
The  robe  to  mock,  the  thorny  crown  to  wound. 

Was  it  not  good,  a  guerdon  past  belief, 
His  loving  message  to  the  dying  thief, 
The  pardon  which  the  Heaven's  high  Majesty 
Sealed  to  this  wreckage  of  Humanity? 

Methinks  the  anguish  of  that  hour  was  paid 
When  the  low  wretch  his  supplication  made, 
And  the  meek  King,  divinely  fair  and  wise, 
Returned  it  with  the  gift  of  Paradise. 

Sunday,  January  1st.  .  .  .  But  while  I  live, 
dear  Lord,  let  me  truly  live  in  energetic  thought 
and  rational  action.  Bless,  I  pray  thee,  my  own 
dear  family,  my  blessed  country,  Christendom 
and  all  mankind.  This  is  my  daily  prayer  and  I 
record  it  here.  Is  it  amiss  that  in  this  prayer  my 
own  people  come  first?  No,  for  family  affection 
is  the  foundation  of  all  normal  human  relation. 
We  begin  with  the  Heavenly  Father  and  open 
out  to  the  whole  human  brotherhood. 

Friday,  January  20th.  .  .  .  You  can't  do 
good  with  a  bad  action.  (Apropos  of  the  shot 

125 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

fired  at  the  Czar.)  The  reason  why  a  little 
knowledge  is  dangerous  is  that  your  conceit  of  it 
may  make  you  refuse  to  learn  more. 


Sunday,  February  5th.  ...  At  Communion 
I  asked  earnestly  for  a  word  and  this  came  to  me : 

"Christ  wished  to  be  remembered,  a  human 
trait  in  which  he  shows  his  sympathy  with  us. 
Do  we  not  all  desire  to  be  remembered?  When 
we  approach  the  limits  which  will  separate  us 
from  familiar  scenes  and  belongings,  do  we  not 
wish  to  remain  a  living  presence  in  the  mind  of 
our  friends?  Christ  did  not  desire  this  for  his 
own  sake  only.  He  knew  how  precious  is  the 
element  of  personality,  how  much  more  easily  we 
should  follow  his  doctrine  and  example,  if  we 
should  cherish  a  personal  remembrance  of  him. 
In  other  speculations  on  religious  topics  our 
thoughts  grow  dim  and  vague.  It  is  so  hard  to 
think  clearly  on  these  great  mysteries  of  spiritual 
life  and  relation.  This  Communion  brings  back" 
to  our  minds  "the  glory  of  God  in  the  face  of 
Jesus  Christ."  We  are  in  the  presence  of  the 
living  Father,  of  the  dear  Brother.  We  are 
again  at  that  solemn  feast  in  the  upper  chamber 
at  Jerusalem.  We  see  the  bread  that  was  broken, 
the  cup  which  was  tasted  in  bitterness,  but  which 
was  destined  to  become  a  cup  of  resplendent  joy 
and  glory  for  all  mankind.  We  feel  the  pres 
ence  which  was  promised  to  be  with  us  to  the  end 
of  the  world." 
126 


THE   WALK    WITH    GOD 

Sunday,  February  I2th.  (After  a  concert.) 
.  .  .  The  thought  that  God  had  set  all  human 
life  and  work  to  music  overpowered  me,  and 
coming  home  I  had  a  rhapsody  of  thanksgiving 
for  the  wonderful  gift.  .  .  . 

Friday,  May  5th.  ...  I  prayed  that  I  might 
never  anywhere  undertake  to  speak  without 
a  true  heartfelt  word  to  say.  No  "sounding 
brass  and  tinkling  cymbal."  ...  I  spoke  of 
the  necessity  for  religion  inherent  in  the  human 
constitution;  the  old  ideas  which  made  religion 
appear  inimical  to  real  life;  of  Christ's  word 
"That  they  might  have  life,"  and  of  what  our 
church  had  been  to  me,  "leading  me  on  by  sweet 
music." 

Without  religion  you  will  never  know  the  real 
beauty  and  glory  of  life;  you  will  perceive  the 
discords,  but  miss  the  harmony;  will  see  the  de 
fects,  but  not  the  good  in  all  things.  .  .  . 

May  2yth.  My  86th  birthday.  ...  I  ask, 
"What  shall  I  render  to  the  Lord  for  His  good 
ness  to  me?"  He  will  show  me  what  I  shall  do, 
for  surely  He  has  not  granted  me  this  extension 
of  life  and  of  working  power  for  no  good  end. 

June  nth.  Whitsunday  at  the  dear  Church 
of  the  Disciples.  Our  last  Communion  service 
in  that  dear  place  (i.e.  before  removing  to  a 
new  building).  It  was  given  to  me  to  say 
these  words:  "I  have  been  asking  myself  how 

127 


THE   WALK    WITH    GOD 

people  like  most  of  us  can  have  any  true  idea 
of  goodness,  perfect  and  divine.  As  I  entered 
this  dear  place  the  thought  came  to  me  that  we 
can  only  know  goodness  by  love,  and  we  know 
love  by  its  gifts.  So  on  this  consecrated  day  we 
recognize  the  love  of  God  in  the  gifts  of  God,  by 
His  Providence  which  in  dark  ages  stirred  up  for 
us  inspired  souls;  the  glorious  law-giver  Moses, 
the  Hebrew  prophets,  and  him  in  whom  their 
prophecies  culminated,  the  Christ  who  is  coming 
to  his  own  to  rule  the  world.  Perhaps  the  great 
est  gift  of  all  is  that  God  has  given  us  the  power 
to  work  with  Him,  so  that  we  are  not  only  the 
heirs  of  the  ages  (but)  of  His  revelations  which 
have  been  handed  down  from  one  generation  to 
another.  He  has  enabled  us  to  give  as  well  as  to 
receive,  and  thus  even  in  the  humblest  way  to 
add  something  to  the  gifts,  beyond  words,  beyond 
thought,  beyond  measure,  with  which  God  has 
made  us  rich."  .  .  .  Dear  Lord,  grant  me  a 
new  Pentecost,  a  fresh  inspiring. 

Tuesday,  September  5th.  Some  bright  mo 
ments  to-day.  At  my  prayer  a  thought  of  the 
divine  hand  reaching  down  over  the  abyss  of  evil 
to  rescue  despairing  souls.  At  my  reading  a 
thought  of  the  great  spiritual  presence  which 
made  itself  felt  by  the  writers  of  the  psalms,  and 
a  persuasion  of  the  infinite  beneficence  of  God, 
all  most  consoling  and  uplifting. 

Saturday,  October  2 1  St.  .  .  .  "Love  to  learn 
and  learn  to  love." 
128 


THE  NEW  HYMN 
May  30,  1905 

With  echoes  of  a  time  long  past, 

With  images  that  ne'er  decay, 
With  grief  in  mold  of  glory  cast, 

Draws  near  our  Decoration  Day. 

Hushed  be  the  hum  of  toil  and  thrift, 
Unheard  the  boast  of  ease  and  wealth ; 

A  distant  music  should  uplift 

The  pulse  of  man's  diviner  health. 

Sound,  Bugle,  but  no  more  to  call 
The  gathering  legions  to  their  task. 

Flowers,  bloom  your  brightest,  though  you  fall 
Where  sculptured  stones  a  burial  mask. 

With  noiseless  footsteps  on  they  come, 

With  aspect  solemn  and  severe, 
As  answering  taps  of  muffled  drum, 

The  Heroes  of  the  Past  appear. 

Oh!  silent  Phalanx!  did  we  heed 
The  deathless  message  that  you  bring, 

Armed  should  we  be  for  every  need, 
Trained   for  great  Duties'  marshaling. 

"We  who  our  blooming  manhood  gave 
To  keep  our  Country's  promise  true, 

Salute  you ;  from  each  warrior  grave, 
Our  pledge  of  brotherhood  renew. 

129 


THE    WALK   WITH    GOD 

"Never  for  empty  sound  of  fame, 
Never  for  heaps  of  sordid  gold, 

Never  for  popular  acclaim 

Be  the  Land's  sacred  birthright  sold. 

"Be  this  the  lesson  of  our  fight, 
So  plain  that  many  reading,  run: 

Rise  ever  up  for  human  right, 

And  rest  in  God  when  Right  has  won." 


130 


Monday,  October  23rd.  .  .  .  "Thou  hast 
given  me  the  heritage  of  those  that  fear  Thy 
name."  Psalms  61 15. 

A  good  text  for  a  sermon  on  reverence  for  the 
wisdom  of  the  past.  This  also  occurred  to  me: 
"There  is  no  shadow  without  a  substance,  no 
reflection  without  an  object.  Ergo,  the  image  of 
God  which  is  shadowed  here,  reflected  there,  in 
the  human  mind  throughout  the  ages,  is  not  an 
empty  chimera,  but  represents  a  vital  and  abid 
ing  fact.  As  the  years  behind  me  grow  in  num 
ber,  I  find  myself  depending  more  and  more  upon 
this  persuasion  of  God  in  the  past." 

November  igth.  (After  the  dedication  of  the 
new  Church  of  the  Disciples.)  ...  I  had 
prayed  God  to  give  me  a  good  word  and  I  had 
done  my  best  to  find  one,  so  I  spoke  with  more 
confidence  than  usual,  and  felt  sure  I  did  not 
speak  in  vain.  A  heart-response  seemed  to  come 
from  the  congregation,  and  I  said  to  myself, 
"The  shaft  was  polished." 

December  3 1st.  .  .  .  "Ye  show  the  Lord's 
death  till  he  come."  What  is  the  Lord's  death 
which  we  are  to  show?  It  is  the  death  to  self 
and  sense,  to  all  that  is  base,  selfish  and  unworthy 
in  our  nature,  so  mixed  with  good  and  evil. 
Paul  said:  "I  die  daily."  Sleep  is  an  image  of 
this  death.  It  brings  a  blessed  resurrection,  a 
new  beginning  with  renewed  hope  and  effort. 


1906 

March  3 1 st.  Was  low  in  my  mind  in  P.M., 
but  had  a  happy  lighting  up  when  I  lay  down 
for  afternoon  rest.  Feel  the  immensity  of  God's 
goodness,  and  took  heart  for  the  future. 

July  25th.  I  had  a  severe  time  at  waking,  re 
membering  so  much  left  undone,  and  the  rest  of 
it.  What  can  comfort  us  but  the  goodness  of 
God,  in  view  of  our  own  shortcomings? 

Friday,  October  26th.  Had  a  sudden  blessed 
thought  this  morning,  viz.:  that  the  tabernacle 
"Eternal  in  the  Heavens"  is  the  eternity  of  truth 
and  right.  I  naturally  desire  life  after  death, 
but  if  it  is  not  granted  me,  I  have  yet  a  part  in 
the  eternal  glory  of  this  tabernacle. 

Tuesday,  November  ijth.  I  had  this  morn 
ing  a  sudden  thought  or  glimpse  of  the  goodness 
of  God,  which  made  me  feel  that  He  can  give  us 
all  of  Heaven  in  one  instant  of  time,  if  He  so 
pleases.  I  ought  to  do  a  better  day's  work  for 
this  vision,  which  indeed  had  nothing  visual  in  it, 
only  an  instantaneous  suggestion. 


132 


AT  CHURCH 

Within  the  many  mansions 

That  God's  dear  love  doth  keep, 

Where  is  the  darksome  closet 
That  hides  the  miser's  heap  ? 

I  saw  the  miser  walking 

With  others,  robed  in  white, 

No  frown  upon  his  forehead, 
His  features  all  alight. 

"Oh,  friend,  where  is  thy  treasure, 
Gathered  in  many  a  year?" 

"I'm  richer  far  without  it ; 
We  want  no  money  here." 


133 


(From  a  notebook) 

"The  Sabbath  is  my  best  debt  to  the  Past,  and 
binds  me  to  some  gratitude  still.  It  brings  me 
that  frankincense  out  of  a  sacred  antiquity." 
R.  W.  Emerson's  funeral. 

The  Church  of  Christ  is  no  completed  thing, 
but  a  perpetual  protest  against  evil  never  van 
quished,  and  a  promise  towards  a  kingdom  of 
Heaven  never  reached. 


134 


1907 

January  1st.  I  earnestly  pray  for  God's 
blessing  on  this  year.  .  .  .  The  dear  Father 
has  done  so  much  better  for  me,  in  many  ways, 
than  I  have  ingenuity  to  wish  that  I  can  only  say, 
"Thy  will  be  done,  only  desert  me  not." 

September  27th.  Had  quite  a  visioning  dur 
ing  my  noontime  "lie-down."  Transported  with 
gratitude  for  the  blessings  of  life  to  me  and  to 
all  people.  Prayed  for  some  way  of  expressing 
this  gratitude  in  word  or  deed.  Seemed  to  get 
in  answer  the  text,  "Few  and  evil  have  the  days 
of  my  pilgrimage  been"  to  preach  from,  express 
ing  the  contrary  feeling  on  my  part,  as  my  days 
have  been  many  and  full  of  good,  in  spite  of  my 
own  grievous  shortcomings. 

November  3rd.  To  my  dear  church.  It  was 
Communion  Sunday,  and  dear  C.  G.  A.  told  me 
in  an  undertone  that  I  might  have  my  usual  lib 
erty.  So  I  think  that  the  dear  Lord  helped  me  to 
say  a  few  words  about  the  divine  hospitality  which 
gives  us  this  feast,  "which  is  the  Lord's  supper, 
and  he  has  made  it  ours,  an  invitation  which 
has  lasted  nigh  upon  two  thousand  years  and  still 
holds  good !" 

November  I5th.  It  occurs  to  me  that  it 
might  be  more  blessed  to  help  the  souls  in  hell 
than  to  luxuriate  with  saints  in  heaven. 

135 


1908 

January  ist.  My  first  word  in  this  record  of 
a  new  year  must  be  a  prayer  to  the  Heavenly 
Father  that  I  may  waste  none  of  the  precious 
time  granted  me  to  so  unusual  an  extent.  The 
last  year  was  rich  in  work  and  experience.  I 
scarcely  dare  to  hope  for  another  as  fruitful  in 
both  of  these  regards,  but  I  shall  hope  that  in  it 
I  may  do  my  best  with  such  ability  as  God  may 
grant  me.  I  do  pray  to  this  end.  Amen,  amen. 

January  I2th.  A  heavily  rainy  morning. 
Could  not  go  to  church.  Had  prayed  the  dear 
Father  to  give  me  this  one  more  poem,  a  verse 
for  this  year's  Decoration  Day,  asked  for  by 
Amos  Wells  of  Christian  Endeavor  belonging. 
I  took  my  pen  and  the  poem  came  quite  spon 
taneously.  It  seemed  an  answer  to  my  prayer, 
but  I  hold  fast  the  thought  that  the  great  Christ 
asked  no  sign  from  God  and  needed  none,  so 
deeply  did  he  enter  into  life  divine.  I  also 
thought  regarding  Christ  and  Moses,  that  we 
must  be  content  that  a  certain  mystery  should 
envelop  these  heroic  figures  of  human  history. 
Our  small  measuring  tape  or  rod  is  not  for  them. 
If  they  were  not  exactly  what  we  take  them  to 
be,  let  us  deeply  reverence  the  human  mind  whicli 
has  conceived  and  built  up  such  splendid  and  im 
mortal  ideals.  Was  not  Christ  thinking  of  some 
thing  like  this  when  he  made  the  sin  against  the 
Holy  Ghost  and  its  manifestations  the  only  un- 
136 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

pardonable  error?  He  surely  did  not  mean  to 
say  that  it  was  beyond  the  repentance  which  is 
the  earnest  of  forgiveness  to  every  sin. 

February  2nd.  .  .  .  Communion  service,  at 
which  this  word  was  granted  me.  "I  have  been 
thinking  of  two  things  very  different  from  each 
other,  yet  with  the  same  meaning.  First,  the 
theory  of  some  philosophers,  that  the  distinctions 
of  time  result  simply  from  our  modes  of  thinking. 
We  can  only  bear  our  weight  of  thought  by  day's 
lengths,  while  the  eternal  present  is  ever  here. 
The  other  is  the  word  of  the  Psalmist,  that  to 
God  a  thousand  years  are  as  yesterday  when  it" 
is  past,  or  as  a  watch  in  the  night,  only  a  frag 
ment  of  the  twenty-four  hours.  How  near  does 
this  thought  bring  our  commemoration  to  that 
last  supper,  Christ  and  his  disciples!  It  is  only 
these  two  years  of  God  away.  The  wish  that  we 
could  feel  his  very  sorrow,  that  divine  sorrow 
over  the  sin  and  suffering  of  mankind,  and  this 
long  way  that  the  human  race  must  travel  before 
it  can  even  see  the  way  out  of  it.  And  with  this 
suffering,  the  divine  joy  mixed  with  it,  the  joy 
of  knowing  that  the  victory  of  Good  over  Evil  is 
sure,  that  the  way  of  mankind  is  God-ward,  in 
spite  of  all  our  ignorance  and  evil.  Would  not 
our  two-fold  vision  determine  us  each  to  place 
society  upon  a  higher  level,  each  to  do  what  he 
can  to  help  lift  this  common  weight?"  People 
thanked  me  much  for  these  words,  for  which  I 
thank  God. 

137 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

March  loth.  On  lying  down  for  my  usual 
rest,  I  was  seized  with  a  fit  of  visioning  such  as 
I  have  not  had  in  a  long  time.  My  thought  was 
that  Christ  saw  the  world  as  God  sees  it.  My 
prayer,  that  I  might  once,  if  only  for  a  moment, 
see  it  thus.  I  tried  to  express  this  in  some  poor 
halting  rhymes  which  I  will  try  later  to  improve. 

May  3rd.  Another  churchless  Sunday.  Ah 
me!  Don't  let  me  get  the  habit  of  not  going! 

(N.  B.  She  was  physically  unable  to  go  at 
this  time.) 

November  28th.  Have  been  much  troubled 
of  late  by  uncertainties  about  life  beyond  the 
present.  Quite  suddenly,  very  recently,  it  oc 
curred  to  me  to  consider  that  Christ  understood 
that  spiritual  life  would  not  end  with  death,  and 
that  his  expressed  certainty  as  to  the  future  life 
was  founded  upon  his  discernment  of  spiritual 
things.  So,  in  so  far  as  I  am  a  Christian,  I  must 
believe  in  the  immortality  of  the  soul,  as  our 
Master  surely  did.  I  cannot  understand  why  I 
have  not  thought  of  this  before.  I  think  now 
that  I  shall  nevermore  lose  sight  of  it. 

November  2Qth.  .  .  .  The  dear  minister's 
sermon  was  upon  the  great  Faith  chapter  of  the 
Epistle  to  the  Hebrews.  .  .  .  Taking  all  this 
with  my  meditations,  I  feel  as  if  I  were  placed  in 
the  saddle  again,  as  if  a  firm  hand  had  lifted  and 
placed  me  there. 

138 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

December  Qth.  Wrote  screed  for  Simmons 
College:  "And  God  saw  all  that  He  had  made, 
and  behold,  it  was  very  good."  Not  to  lose  the 
good  in  the  world  through  ignorance  of  it. 


139 


1909 

March  3rd.  Our  experience  of  the  goodness 
of  God  in  our  daily  life  assures  us  of  His  mercy 
hereafter,  and  seeing  God  everywhere,  we  shall 
dwell  in  the  house  of  the  Lord  forever. 

March  27th.  Had  to-day  a  little  bit  of  vision- 
ing  with  which  I  think  that  I  could  willingly  de 
part,  when  my  time  comes.  The  dreadful  fear 
of  being  buried  alive  disappeared  for  a  time  and 
I  saw  only  the  goodness  of  God,  to  which  it 
seemed  that  I  could  trust  all  question  of  the  fu 
ture  life.  I  said  to  myself:  "The  best  will  be  for 
thee  and  me." 

April  8th.  My  prayer  for  this  Easter  is  that 
I  may  not  waste  the  inspiration  of  Spring.  This 
may  very  easily  be  my  last  on  earth.  God  pre 
pare  me  for  what  shall  be ! 

July  4th.  I  had  a  good  meditation  of  which 
I  will  record  a  little  here.  The  three  great 
questions  of  our  spiritual  thought  are  these: 
whence,  whither,  where  ?  Whence  come  we  and 
the  order  of  our  Day?  Whither  do  we  journey 
and  where  do  we  arrive?  To  all  three  the  an 
swer  seems  to  me  to  be  "God."  The  fundamen 
tal  doctrine  of  Christianity  is  the  compatibility 
of  all  real  human  interests.  We  must  study  till 
we  find  the  secret  of  this.  Machines  do  much 
toward  this  reconciliation.  I  think  even  that 
140 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

Governor  Draper's  automatic  loom  may  prove 
a  step  in  the  true  direction  since  it  releases  so 
many  humans  from  the  necessity  of  bodily  fa 
tigue  and  risk.  Query:  What  becomes  of  the 
humans  who  used  to  tend  the  looms?  How  can 
we  every  day  have  the  consciousness  of  God 
which  is  essential  to  true  worship  ? 

i 

August  3rd.  A  soupfon  of  east  wind  brought 
me  very  foolish  vagaries  of  mind,  which  soon 
gave  way  to  better  thoughts.  I  seemed  to  say  to 
God,  "If  any  one  I  know  was  as  sorry  as  I  am 
for  all  that  has  been  amiss  with  my  life,  I  think 
I  should  forgive  him  or  her." 

Had  a  delightful  sitting  under  my  tree  with 
the  last  verse  of  the  twenty-third  Psalm. 

October  I2th.  Think  it  was  to-day  that  in 
lying  down  a  sudden  feeling  of  my  errors  and 
shortcomings  in  life  seemed  to  give  me  a  most 
blessed  assurance  of  God's  Fatherhood.  I  desire 
to  recall  this  often. 

October  30th.  Have  had  what  I  may  call  a 
spasm  of  gratitude  to  God  for  His  great  good 
ness  to  me,  sitting  in  my  pleasant  little  parlor 
with  the  lovely  golden  trees  in  near  view,  and 
the  devotion  of  my  children  and  great  kindness 
of  my  friends  well  in  mind.  Oh,  help  me,  divine 
Father,  to  merit  even  a  very  little  of  Thy  kind 
ness  ! 

141 


THE   WALK   WITH    GOD 

December  25th.  Thanks  to  God  who  gave  us 
the  blessed  Christ!  What  a  birthday  was  this! 
Two  thousand  years  have  only  increased  our 
gratitude  for  it.  How  it  has  consecrated  Baby 
hood  and  Maternity!  Two  infants,  grown  to 
man's  estate,  govern  the  civilized  world  to-day, 
Christ  and  Moses.  I  am  thankful  to  be  still 
here  in  the  flesh  as  they  were  once.  Oh !  that  I 
may  never  pass  where  they  are  not. 


142 


TO  PHILOSOPHY 

I  have  served  thee  like  a  slave, 
Took  whate'er  thy  right  hand  gave. 
With  thy  holy  robes  of  state 
I  my  meanness  did  not  mate, 
Counterfeiting  wise  and  great. 

But  I  might  remove  the  dust 
Gathered,  and  the  mournful  rust, 
Where,  unmarked  of  careless  eye, 
Thy  neglected  glories  lie. 

Once  I  saw  a  serving-maid 
Dead,  in  goodly  garb  arrayed. 
From  her  earnings  she  had  saved 
Gold,  and  these  last  splendors  craved. 

So  when  I  am  dead  and  gone, 
Robe  thou  me,  O  holy  one! 
Let  thy  sacred  livery 
O'er  my  marble  features  lie; 
Service  in  thy  noble  house 
Fill  my  record,  pay  my  vows. 


143 


1910 

April  1st.  Very  much  tossed  up  and  down 
about  my  poem  for  James  Freeman  Clarke's  cen 
tenary.  ...  I  repeated  to that  I  had  ar 
rived  at  the  conclusion  that  to  help  the  religious 
progress  of  mankind  was  to  give  them  the  great 
est  benefaction.  I  said :  "That  may  be  the  most 
frequent  taste,  but  it  is  the  rarest  talent." 

April  3rd.  .  .  .  Coughed  in  the  night  and  at 
waking.  Suffered  much  in  mind,  fearing  that  a 
wild  fit  of  coughing  might  make  my  reading  (of 
her  poem  for  Dr.  Clarke's  Centenary)  unaccept 
able  and  even  ridiculous.  Imagine  my  joy  when 
I  found  my  voice  clear  and  even  strong,  and 
read  the  whole  poem  (forty-four  lines),  without 
the  slightest  inclinatiqn  to  cough.  This  really 
was  the  granting  of  my  prayer,  and  my  first 
thought  about  it  was:  "What  shall  I  render 
to  the  Lord  for  all  His  goodness  to  me?"  I 
thought:  "I  will  interest  myself  more  efficiently 
in  the  great  questions  which  concern  Life  and 
Society  at  large." 

May  27th.  .  .  .  What  dare  I  ask  for  more? 
Only  that  I  may  do  something  in  the  future  to 
deserve  all  this  love  and  gratitude.  I  have  in 
tended  to  deserve  it  all  and  more,  yet  when  in 
thought  I  review  my  life,  I  feel  the  waste 
and  loss  of  power  through  want  of  outlook. 
144 


MEDITATION 

My  temple  has  a  lofty  roof 
Wherein  all  planets  are  at  home: 
My  sight,  which  holds  a  world  aloof, 
Still  fails  to  circumscribe  its  dome: 
While  verdure-covered  pines  and  larches 
Astounding  columns  rear,  and  arches. 

The  floor  of  emeralds,  gold-embossed, 
Is  swept  and  garnished,  free  of  cost, 
Its  music-pipes  the  birds  supply, 
Singing  like  angels  as  they  fly. 
Where  is  its  altar's  watch  and  ward? 
Dear  God !  it  is  not  veiled  or  barred. 
Where'er  a  penitent  shall  kneel, 
A  contrite  heart  its  burthen  feel, 
Or  where  pure  spirits,  glad  and  free, 
Thrill  with  the  touch  of  ecstasy, 
Refuge  of  rapture  or  despair, 
There  waits  true  worship :  God  is  there. 


UNDATED  FRAGMENTS 

(The  following  prayer  was  written  in  August, 
1910,  at  the  request  of  an  American  woman,  mar 
ried  in  British  Columbia,  who  had  formed  a  club 
of  American  women  for  patriotic  purposes.) 

August.  O  Thou  whose  gifts  are  beyond 
words,  Thou  in  whose  merciful  Fatherhood  we 
are  content  to  rest,  help  us  to  know  that 
Thou  art  near  us  to-day  and  every  day  of 
our  mortal  lives!  Thou  hast  wonderfully 
framed  us  with  capacities  for  good  and  for  evil, 
opened  to  us  the  knowledge  of  good  and  evil, 
for  noble  progress  or  for  selfish  indolence  and 
infirmity  of  purpose,  and  hast  endowed  us  with 
power  to  pursue  the  one  and  to  avoid  and  oppose 
the  other.  Give  us,  we  pray  Thee,  that  strength 
which  can  come  from  Thee  alone,  that  faith  in 
the  power  of  good  deeds  and  purposes  which  can 
enable  us  to  overcome  the  infirmities  of  our 
nature  and  not  only  to  acquiesce  in  Thy  will,  but 
to  be  zealous  for  its  fulfillment.  May  a  sense 
of  the  true  values  of  life  restrain  us  from  all 
unfruitful  wanderings  from  the  way  appointed 
for  us.  Give  us  the  patience  of  Thy  saints,  the 
wisdom  of  Thy  prophets,  the  self-devotion  of  Thy 
martyrs,  and  let  our  weekly  worship  place  us 
within  the  limits  of  the  great  church  universal 
which  embraces  Divine  Love  and  human  service. 

O,  Thou  whose  best  gifts  are  best  in  that 
they  reveal  Thyself,  be  pleased  to  continue  to  us, 
146 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

residents  in  a  strange  country,  the  mighty  in 
heritance  of  our  own  dear  land.  The  truths 
made  known  to  saints  of  old  on  mountain  tops 
of  prayer,  or  in  the  wholesome  valleys  of  humility, 
let  them  guide  our  feet  in  the  sincerity  of 
wisdom.  Never  let  us  doubt  that  Thy  loving 
foresight  encircles  our  path  with  a  principle  of 
defense  which  cannot  be  gainsaid  nor  overcome. 
May  we  hold  as  our  greatest  treasure  the  truth 
that  Humanity  is  one,  and  that  to  keep  its  glori 
ous  domain,  regard  must  be  had  to  what  each 
may  claim  from  all  and  all  from  each,  freedom, 
sympathy,  and  justice.  Let  us  remember  that 
our  lives  are  not  ours  to  waste  in  unfruitful 
pleasure,  but  in  loving  service,  which  we  shall 
perform,  as  Thou,  our  God,  shalt  instruct  and 
guide  us,  in  the  name  of  Thy  mighty  ones  who 
have  overcome  the  deceitful  and  selfish  world, 
and  are  gathered  in  the  priceless  harvest. 


147 


(An  answer  to  the  question:  "What  is  reli 
gion.'") 

I  should  say,  religion  is  the  loving  recognition 
of  the  right,  and  the  resolution  to  aid,  further 
and  exemplify  it  by  grateful  and  willing  service 
to  the  Divine  and  the  Humane  history  of  Re 
ligions  shows  the  progress  of  the  race,  but  in  it 
all,  the  permanence  of  certain  convictions.  The 
tables  of  Moses  still  rule  the  civilized  world, 
and  the  Christian  church  still  rehearses  them  with 
the  doctrines  of  its  Founder.  But  Christ  dares 
to  point  out  the  limitations  of  Moses,  and  the 
strength  of  his  gravamen  against  the  Jews  lies 
in  their  failure  to  recognize  the  teachings  of  the 
later  time.  In  their  blind  and  literal  interpreta 
tion  of  the  sacred  traditions  they  fail  to  discern 
and  follow  its  true  guidance.  Moses,  for  the 
hardness  of  their  hearts,  delivered  to  them  the 
precepts  which  they  were  able  to  follow,  but  the 
new  and  divine  interpretation  of  the  spirit  of  the 
divine  law  pointed  to  new  duties  and  required  of 
them  fresh  sacrifices  and  efforts,  and  so  I  should 
say  that  any  religion  which  prohibits  the  onward 
movement  of  the  human  mind  and  conscience  is 
so  far  wanting  in  one  important  element  of 
Religion,  the  onward  impulse  of  Faith  and  Hope. 
Where  this  is  wanting,  the  third  and  greatest, 
Charity,  is  usually  also  wanting. 

The  cruelties  of  human  judgment,  of  human 
criticism,  are  all  doomed  to  give  place  to  a  can 
did  spirit  of  justice.  Those  functions  are  per- 
148 


THE   WALK   WITH    GOD 

petual  in  society,  but  they  can  be  so  exercised 
as  to  kill,  in  the  one  instance,  to  cure  in  the  other. 
The  cup  of  Christian  Communion  appears  to  me 
the  pledge  of  this  reconciled  and  redeemed  hu 
manity.  It  is  the  Holy  Grail,  and  all  shall  taste 
it  and  with  it  taste  the  sweetness  of  self-sacrifice, 
of  self-surrender. 

Life  is  something,  while  the  senses  heed 

The  spirit's  call; 
Life  is  nothing,  when  our  grosser  need 

Engulfs  it  all. 


149 


BEYOND  THE  VEIL* 

I  am  invited  to  write  a  paper  of  some  two 
thousand  words  on  the  subject  of  Immortality. 
I  accept  this  invitation  to  discourse  in  print  upon 
a  theme  which  has  long  been  familiar  to  me.  I 
believe  that  some  part  of  me  is  immortal.  I 
have  always  so  believed.  It  should  be  easy  to 
give  some  account  of  the  why  and  wherefore  of 
this  belief,  yet,  strange  to  say,  I  do  not  find  it 
so.  The  effort  of  many  days  has  only  produced 
a  certain  set  of  disjointed  statements  which, 
although  in  no  wise  contradictory  to  one  an 
other,  cannot,  with  my  poor  skill,  be  made  to 
introduce  and  explain  one  another.  Perhaps  the 
best  thing  I  can  attempt  will  be  to  examine 
briefly  what  I  really  think  about  a  future  life, 
and,  if  possible,  why  I  think  so  and  not  other 
wise. 

To  begin,  then,  with  the  simple  notions  of  my 
childhood.  I  was  born  in  a  world  in  which  the 
belief  in  a  future  life  was  almost  unquestioned. 
The  blessedness  of  heaven  and  the  torment  of 
hell  were  presented  to  my  infant  imagination  as 
the  ultimates  of  my  good  or  ill  conduct  in  every 
day  life.  Like  most  other  children,  I  believed 
what  I  was  told,  and  in  general  tried  to  obey 
the  commands  of  my  elders.  I  loved  to  hear 
about  the  heavenly  life,  which  somehow  seemed 

*  Copyright  1910.  Reprinted  from  In  After  Days 
by  permission  of  Harper  &  Brothers,  owners  of  the 
copyright. 

150 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

to  furnish  the  skyscape  of  my  days  as  they  were 
added  in  weeks,  months,  and  years.  I  recall 
having  once  made  an  offering  to  the  God  of  my 
childish  prayers.  The  altar  was  a  little  stool, 
the  sacrifice  some  small  objects  which  I  supposed 
to  be  of  value.  I  remember  also  refusing  to 
say  my  prayers  to  a  new  nursery  assistant,  be 
cause  it  did  not  appear  to  me  fitting  to  take 
a  stranger  into  my  confidence,  a  scruple  which 
the  authorities  of  the  same  nursery  speedily 
overruled. 

Wordsworth  has  said: 

"Heaven  lies  about  us  in  our  infancy," 
And  "trailing  clouds  of  glory  do  we  come 
From  God,  who  is  our  home." 

And  later,  Emerson  says  of  Michel  Angelo, 
"Himself  from  God  he  could  not  free." 

Even  so  naturally  did  my  idea  of  merit  include 
a  divine  Absolute,  whom  to  please  or  displease 
would  furnish  the  tests  of  good  or  ill  con 
duct. 

Let  us  pass  over  many  years  of  experience, 
individual,  mostly  not  unusual,  and  come  to 
where  the  enlightened  intellect  of  the  twen 
tieth  century  finds  itself  obliged  to  stand.  It 
is  jjerforce  an  age  of  question,  and  all  thought 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

which  penetrates  below  the  surface  of  things- 
must  take  this  attitude  of  interrogation,  which 
should  be  reverent,  and  which  may  be  insolent. 
In  the  first  place,  this  wonder  book,  the  Bible. 
Is  it  an  exception  to  all  human  rules  and  laws 
of  action?  Did  the  ancient  chroniclers  do  their 
best  to  set  down  the  record  of  Creation  and  its 
consequences?  Did  the  psalmist,  the  prophet, 
the  moralist,  each  in  turn  contribute  his  highest 
human  power  of  expression  and  forethought  to 
this  marvelous  treasure  of  an  Eastern  people? 
Or  did  the  living  God  of  Israel  dictate  the  vol 
ume,  chapter  and  verse,  to  scribes  especially 
selected?  Once  this  question  would  have  been 
held  to  be  impious.  Now  it  is  inevitable ;  and  if 
the  Book  is  a  human  work  its  contents  must 
be  judged  by  human  standards. 

Supposing  this  to  be  so  decided,  the  systems 
of  promise  and  threat  which  men  have  built  upon 
it  are  also  without  the  authority  of  the  abso 
lute,  and  our  dreams  of  an  endless  future  of 
recompense,  painful  or  pleasurable,  for  the  deeds 
done  in  the  body,  have  all  the  qualities  of  dreams 
and  none  other. 

What  then  ?  Have  we  lost  our  God  ?  Never 
for  one  moment.  Unspeakable,  He  is;  the  benef 
icent  parent,  the  terrible,  incorruptible  judge, 
the  champion  of  the  innocent,  the  accuser  of  the 
guilty,  refuge,  hope,  redeemer,  friend;  neither 
palace  walls  nor  prison  cells  can  keep  Him  out. 
Every  step  of  our  way  from  the  birth  hour  He 
has  gone  with  us.  Were  we  at  the  gallows' 
152 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

foot,  and  deservedly,  He  would  leave  a  sweet 
drop  in  the  cup  of  death.  He  would  measure 
suffering  to  us,  but  would  forbid  despair.  The 
victory  of  goodness  must  be  complete.  The  lost 
sheep  must  be  found — ay,  and  the  lost  soul  must 
turn  to  the  way  in  which  the  peace  of  God 
prevails.  We  learn  the  dreadful  danger  of  those 
who  wander  from  the  right  path,  but  we  may 
also  learn  the  redeeming  power  which  recalls 
and  reclaims  them. 

So  fade  our  heavens  and  hells.  Christ,  if  he 
knew  their  secrets,  did  not  betray  them.  On 
the  boundless  sea  of  conjecture  we  are  still  afloat, 
with  such  mental  tools  as  we  possess  to  guide 
us,  with  the  skies,  the  stars,  the  seasons,  seeking 
a  harbor  from  which  no  voyager  has  ever  re 
turned. 

So  much,  the  later  schemes  of  thought  have 
taken  from  us.  Shall  we  ask  what  they  have 
given  us  in  exchange  for  what  we  have  lost? 

It  seems  a  little  strange  that  with  the  ac 
cumulated  wisdom  and  power  of  the  ages  a  far 
mer's  son  of  Massachusetts  should  have  been 
the  first  clearly  to  enunciate  this  important 
phrase,  "The  transient  and  permanent  in  reli 
gion."  We  must  have  known  of  this  distinction 
all  along.  In  all  that  we  think,  and  in  much 
that  we  believe,  constant  growth  and  metamor 
phosis  take  place.  Paul  says,  "When  I  was  a 
child,  I  thought  as  a  child ;  I  believed  as  a  child." 
How  full  of  beauty  were  these  visions  of  child 
hood,  but  also  how  evanescent,  each  evolving  it- 

153 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

self    into    one    more    advanced    in    thought,    in 
understanding,  until  the  moment  in  which  Love 

"Smote  the  chord  of  self,  that  trembling 
Passed  in  music  out  of  sight." 

Does  our  acquaintance  with  this  wonder  world 
terminate  with  the  days  and  years  of  our  age? 
Shall  death  forever  divide  us  from  all  the 
marvelous  story  of  our  spiritual  experiences  of 
evil  seeming  for  a  time  to  prevail,  of  the  blessed 
eternal  good  whose  conquest  of  evil  is  certain 
and  final? 

Tell  us,  you  stars  mysteriously  hung  to 
measure  the  depths  of  the  heavens.  Tell  us, 
thou  pitiable,  shameful  way  of  excess  and  error, 
with  thy  heroic  redemption.  Let  the  Jew  speak: 

"Whither  shall  I  go  from  Thy  presence?  If 
I  ascend  into  heaven,  Thou  art  there.  If  I  make 
my  bed  in  hell,  behold!  Thou  art  there  also." 

Let  the  apostle  speak :  "Who  shall  separate  us 
from  the  love  of  Christ?"  In  all  these  things 
we  are  conquerors,  through  Him  that  loved 
us,  and  loving  once,  loves  ever. 

To  me  has  been  granted  a  somewhat  unusual 
experience  of  life.  Ninety  full  years  have  been 
measured  off  to  me,  their  lessons  and  opportu 
nities  unabridged  by  wasting  disease  or  gnawing 
poverty.  I  have  enjoyed  general  good  health, 
comfortable  circumstances,  excellent  company, 
and  the  incitements  to  personal  effort  which 
civilized  society  offers  to  its  members.  For  this 

154 


THE   WALK   WITH    GOD 

life  and  its  gifts  I  am,  I  hope,  devoutly  thank 
ful.  I  came  into  this  world  a  hopeless  and 
ignorant  bit  of  humanity.  I  have  found  in  it 
many  helps  toward  the  attainment  of  my  full 
human  stature,  material,  mental,  moral.  In  this 
slow  process  of  attainment  many  features  have 
proved  transient.  Visions  have  come  and  gone. 
Seasons  have  bloomed  and  closed,  passions  have 
flamed  and  faded.  Something  has  never  left  me. 
My  relation  to  it  has  suffered  many  changes, 
but  it  still  remains,  the  foundation  of  my  life, 
light  in  darkness,  consolation  in  ill  fortune,  guide 
in  uncertainty. 

In  the  nature  of  things,  I  must  soon  lose  sight 
of  this  sense  of  constant  metamorphosis  whose 
limits  bound  our  human  life.  How  about  this 
unchanging  element?  Will  it  die  when  I  shall 
be  laid  irr  earth?  The  visible  world  has  no 
answer  to  this  question.  For  it,  dead  is  dead, 
and  gone  is  gone.  But  a  deep  spring  of  life 
within  me  says:  "Look  beyond.  Thy  days 
numbered  hitherto  register  a  divine  promise.  Thy 
mortal  dissolution  leaves  this  promise  unful 
filled,  but  not  abrogated.  Thou  mayst  hope  that 
all  that  made  thy  life  divine  will  live  for  thine 
immortal  part." 

I  have  quoted  Theodore  Parker's  great  word, 
and  have  made  no  attempt,  so  far,  to  bring  into 
view  considerations  which  may  set  before  us 
the  fundamental  distinction  between  what  in 
human  experience  passes  and  what  abides. 

In  the  first  place,  human  life  passes,  like  other 

155 


THE   WALK    WITH    GOD 

life.  The  splendid  blossom,  the  noble  fruit.  In 
quire  into  its  power  and  glory  after  two-thirds 
of  a  century  have  passed  over  it.  You  will  find 
weakness  instead  of  strength,  the  mournful  attar 
of  memory  replacing  as  it  can  the  fresh  fra 
grance  of  hope.  The  bowed  form  suggests  the 
segment  of  a  mystic  circle.  The  restricted  mind 
turns  its  tools  into  toys.  "They  did  not  measure 
the  infinite  for  us.  Let  us  get  from  their  uses 
such  pleasures  as  we  can." 

Life  passes,  but  the  conditions  of  life  do  not. 
Air,  food,  water,  the  moral  sense,  the  mathemat 
ical  problem  and  its  solution.  These  things  wait 
upon  one  generation  much  as  they  did  upon  its 
predecessor.  What,  too,  is  this  wonderful  resid 
uum  which  refuses  to  disappear  when  the  very 
features  of  time  seem  to  succumb  to  the  law 
of  change,  and  we  recognize  our  world  no  more  ? 
Whence  comes  this  system  in  which  man  walks  as 
in  an  artificial  frame,  every  weight  and  lever  of 
which  must  correspond  with  the  outlines  of  an 
eternal  pattern? 

Our  spiritual  life  appears  to  include  three 
terms  in  one.  They  are  ever  with  us,  this  Past 
which  does  not  pass,  this  Future  which  never  ar 
rives.  They  are  part  and  parcel  of  this  conscious 
existence  which  we  call  Present.  While  Past 
and  Future  have  each  their  seasons  of  predomin 
ance,  both  are  contained  in  the  moment  which 
is  gone  while  we  say,  "It  is  here." 

So  the  Eternal  is  with  us,  whether  we  will  or 
not,  and  the  idea  of  God  is  inseparable  from  the 
156 


THE    WALK   WITH    GOD 

persuasion  of  immortality ;  the  Being  which,  per 
fect  in  itself,  can  neither  grow  nor  decline,  nor 
indeed  undergo  any  change  whatever.  The  great 
Static  of  the  universe,  the  rationale  of  the  stead 
fast  faith  of  believing  souls,  the  sense  of  beauty 
which  justifies  our  high  enjoyments,  the  sense  of 
proportion  which  upholds  all  that  we  can  think 
about  ourselves  and  our  world,  the  sense  of  per 
manence  which  makes  the  child  in  very  truth 
parent  to  the  man,  able  to  solve  the  deepest  riddle, 
the  profoundest  problem  in  all  that  is.  Let  us 
then  willingly  take  the  Eternal  with  us  in  our 
flight  among  the  suns  and  stars. 

Experience  is  our  great  teacher,  and  on  this 
point  it  is  wholly  wanting.  No  one  on  the  far 
ther  side  of  the  great  Divide  has  been  able  to  in 
form  those  on  the  hither  side  of  what  lies  beyond. 

Yet  our  whole  life,  rightly  interpreted,  shows 
us  the  never-failing  mercy  of  a  divine  Parent. 
We  may  ask,  "Whither  shall  I  go  from  Thy 
presence?"  And  we  may  answer,  "Surely,  good 
ness  and  mercy  shall  follow  me  all  the  days  of 
my  eternal  life,  and  I  shall  dwell  in  the  house 
of  the  Lord  forever." 

The  anticipation  of  a  life  beyond  the  grave  so 
belongs  to  our  human  mastery  over  the  condi 
tions  of  animal  life  that  it  seems  to  be  an  integral 
part  of  our  human  endowment. 

We  feel  something  in  us  that  cannot  die  when 
blood  and  brain,  muscle  and  tissue,  have  reached 
the  brief  and  uncertain  term  of  their  service.  For 
so  long,  the  body  can  perform  its  functions  and 

157 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

hold  together,  but  what  term  is  set  for  the  soul  ? 
Nothing  in  its  make-up  foretokens  a  limited  ex 
istence.  Its  sentence  would  seem  to  be,  "Once 
and  always." 

The  promise  of  a  future  life  is  held  to  have 
such  prominence  in  Christ's  teaching  as  to  lead 
Paul  to  say  that  the  Master  "brought  life  and 
immortality  to  light."  How  did  he  do  this? 
By  filling  the  life  of  to-day  with  the  consciousness 
of  eternal  things,  of  truths  and  principles  which 
would  not  change  if  the  whole  visible  universe 
were  to  pass  away. 

No  one  to-day,  I  think,  will  maintain  that 
Christ  created  the  hope  which  he  aroused  to  an 
activity  before  undreamed  of.  The  majority  of 
the  Jews  believed  in  a  life  after  death,  as  is  shown 
by  the  segregation  of  the  Sadducees  from  the 
orthodox  of  the  synagogue.  The  new  teaching 
vindicated  the  spiritual  rights  and  interests  of 
man.  From  the  depths  of  his  own  heart  was 
evolved  the  consciousness  of  a  good  that  could 
not  die.  Man,  the  creature  of  a  day,  has  a  vested 
interest  in  things  eternal.  The  solid  principles 
upon  which  the  social  world  is  organized,  the 
laws  of  which  Sophocles  makes  Antigone  say  that 
"they  are  not  of  to-day  nor  yesterday." 

Creatures  of  a  day  as  we  seem,  there  is  that  in 
us  which  is  older  than  the  primeval  rocks,  than 
the  'v\rj  out  of  which  this  earth,  our  temporary 
dwelling-place,  was  made.  The  reason  which 
placed  the  stars,  the  sense  of  proportion  which 
we  recognize  in  the  planetary  system,  finds  its 
158 


THE   WALK   WITH   GOD 

correspondence  in  this  brain  of  ours.  We  ques 
tion  every  feature  of  what  we. see,  think,  and 
feel.  We  try  every  link  of  the  chain  and  find  it 
sound  if  we  ourselves  are  sound.  This  power  of 
remotest  question  and  assent  is  not  of  to-day  nor 
yesterday. 

It  transcends  all  bounds  of  time  and  space.  It 
weighs  the  sun,  explores  the  pathway  of  the  stars, 
and  writes,  having  first  carefully  read,  the  history 
of  earth  and  heaven.  It  moves  in  company  with 
the  immortals.  How  much  of  it  is  mortal? 
Only  so  much  as  a  small  strip  of  earth  can  cover. 
These  remains  are  laid  away  with  reverence,  hav 
ing  served  their  time.  But  what  has  become  of 
the  wonderful  power  which  made  them  alive  ?  It 
belongs  to  that  in  nature  which  cannot  die. 

A  babe  wept  on  the  borders  of  the  Nile,  a 
foundling,  destined  for  death,  but  fated  to  dictate 
rules  of  action  to  the  human  world.  How  did 
this  come  about?  The  babe,  rescued  and  grown 
to  manhood,  has  come  upon  something  as  un 
changeable  as  the  law  of  numbers. 

O,  baby  in  the  Nile  shadows,  wiser  than  the 
Sphinx ;  O,  saint  in  the  Athenian  prison ;  O,  dis 
coverer  of  the  second  birth,  regenerator  of  man 
kind — what  do  you  teach  us  ?  The  eternal  hope 
which  lies  in  God's  eternal  goodness.  What  is 
best  for  thee  and  me  will  be. 


159   - 


(From  a  letter.) 

"O,  do  you  know  how  beautiful  that  austere 
vision  of  death  looks  to  one  quite  bewildered  with 
the  perplexities  of  life,  how  consoling,  how  sooth 
ing  the  thought  of  that  sleep  of  new  creation? 
All  the  gifts  of  God  are  good — were  it  not 
strange  if  He  kept  not  the  best  for  the  last?" 


160 


ENDEAVOR 

"What  hast  thou  for  thy  scattered  seed, 

O  Sower  of  the  plain? 
Where  are  the  many  gathered  sheaves 

Thy  hope  should  bring  again?" 
"The  only  record  of  my  work 

Lies  in  the  buried  grain." 

"O  Conqueror  of  a  thousand  fields! 

In  dinted  armor  dight, 
What  growths  of  purple  amaranth 

Shall  crown  thy  brow  of  might?" 
"Only  the  blossom  of  my  life, 

Flung  widely  in  the  fight." 

"What  is  the  harvest  of  thy  saints, 

O  God!  who  dost  abide? 
Where  grow  the  garlands  of  thy  chiefs 

In  blood  and  sorrow  dyed? 
What  have  thy  servants  for  their  pains?" 

"This  only, — to  have  tried." 


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